


Fallen Far From the Tree

by SadaVeniren



Series: Piece by Piece [2]
Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Body Worship, Coming Out, Fluff, M/M, Mpreg, Pregnant Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-10
Updated: 2015-11-01
Packaged: 2018-04-17 03:12:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 41,684
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4650063
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SadaVeniren/pseuds/SadaVeniren
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“I’m so excited.”</p><p>“Me too,” Louis said. “Just think, it’s gonna be you and me forever.” He even managed to sing song the end of the sentence.</p><p>Harry snorted. “That’s not how the line goes. And besides, it’s not gonna be you and me forever. It’s gonna be you, and me, and this little one.”</p><p>He could see the smile stretch across Louis’ face. “Yeah. You’re right.”</p><p>(aka Harry and Louis go through the ups and ups of pregnancy)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. april

**Author's Note:**

> I wasn't going to post this until it was completely finished, but I'm so pissed right now that only posting mpreg larry fic will make me feel vindicated, so here we go. The fluffiest freaking m-preg fic you will probably ever read because Harry and Louis deserve nice things, and a pregnancy that was lovingly crafted and thought out is probably one of them. :D
> 
> I'll probably add more tags as I post the rest of the chapters because right now my brain is too fried to even think, but let me assure you this fic is really just pure fluff. If you are looking for angst or anything dramatic you will not find it in this (except in like one part of chapter 6 but whatever).
> 
> This isn't beta'd so any mistakes are mine :)

Jay found out the next day. It wasn't on purpose. They’d planned on keeping the pregnancy a secret until at least mid-May, after they'd gone to their first appointment together (the earliest they'd be able to go was the first full week of May, but they'd both be in L.A. so they had discussed waiting til they were both back in London). They wanted to get as close as they could to the three month mark without tipping over into tour territory. It wouldn't do to announce it to everyone and make all these plans only for Harry to lose the baby early on.

So they weren't planning on telling anyone, it was just... Harry wasn't supposed to be in England, much less up in Doncaster sneaking into the final team practice and organizing a way to watch the game in cognito. Which meant when Jay saw him the first thing out of her mouth was, "what the hell are you doing here?"

She immediately glanced around to make sure Daisy and Phoebe hadn't heard and then came up to give him a hug. Harry hugged her back and gave her a kiss on the cheek. "Just wanted to surprise Lou for his game. I did text you yesterday."

"I didn't realize you were _here_ though. I thought it was just a quick day trip, but I should have known better. You wouldn't miss this if you didn't have to. Poor Boo was pretty devastated you weren't going to make it, and he's been worried out of his mind what with your stomach." She gave him a final squeeze and her own kiss before letting him go. "You're so good to him. Not going to lie, when I saw your text I thought something bad had happened to make you pop back here. That or you were pregnant or something."

She laughed, but Harry froze. He sent a silent prayer that Jay didn't notice, but of course she did. She had years of child-rearing experience to know when she'd caught wind of the truth. Her eyes were sharp on him as she looked him up and down.

"You're pregnant?"

Harry immediately shook his head, even though he knew it was pointless. Jay knew she had found out the truth and she wasn't going to let up until he confessed. "No! I just wanted to surprise him."

"Who's pregnant?" Phoebe asked, appearing at Jay's hip smiling up at Harry.

 _Shit._ Phoebe was the gossipy one. Daisy he could usually bribe to keep quiet - she'd been the one to walk in on him and Louis a year before they had come out to the rest of Louis' family and all it had taken to keep her silence was tickets to a concert she had wanted to go to with her friends, and day trip to Paris which he and Louis had been more than happy to arrange.

On the other hand Phoebe was loud. If she had been the one to walk in on them she would have turned heel and immediately announced it to the entire house.

Harry needed to do damage control and fast.

"No one's pregnant," he said directly to Phoebe because it was easier to lie to her than Jay. Jay punched him on the arm. "Ow! What the hell, mum?"

"That's for lying to me."

"I'm not lying!" He said rubbing his bicep.

"How could you not tell us you were pregnant!"

"Is Harry pregnant?" Phoebe grinned at him. "You're supposed to use condoms to stop that. We learned all about that in health class. Condoms also stop the spread of disease, so it's even more important to wear them even if you have another form of contraceptive."

"No one has any diseases because monogamy, and _no one is pregnant_ ," Harry said as forcefully as possible, finally looking at Jay.

Her arms were crossed and she looked distinctly unimpressed. "Harry," she said in that tone she got when she knew she'd caught someone in a lie. Harry had only heard it once, when she'd caught Louis sneaking out of Harry's room and she'd asked if there was anything they wanted to tell her.

They hadn't been able to talk their way out of that time either.

Harry felt himself starting to crack just a little, even though he still wanted to keep this a secret. He was only five weeks along; they hadn't visited an actual doctor yet! He’d just pissed on a stick. There were so many factors to take into consideration.

"What's going on here, then?" Louis asked, popping his head into the waiting room they were in. He was sweaty from the light training session he had just been part of, but he was smiling. He hadn't stopped smiling since Harry had told him the news last night. "Hey mum. You get everything sorted, love?" He asked as he walked by Daisy who was looking at her phone. Harry had a moment where he hoped she at least hadn't heard the conversation, but as Louis ruffled her hair she looked up at him and smiled.

"Is it true Harry's pregnant?" Daisy - sweet, perfect, bribable Daisy - was a little traitor.

"No one is pregnant!" He said again, voice squeaking right at the end.

Too bad he said that right as Louis said with a smile on his face, "yeah, but it's really, _really_ early so we don't want anyone to know yet. So this is like, an even bigger secret than our normal secrets."

Jay whooped and punched Harry in the arm again. "I told you not to lie to me! How far along are you?"

"Mum!" Louis said with a sigh. "Can we _not_ punch pregnant people?"

"The doctor thinks I’m only five weeks along. I just found out yesterday and flew right here to tell Louis."

Jay cooed and pulled him into a hug. "My babies are having a baby of their own. I'm so happy for you two." She let go of Harry so she could look him up and down. “Have you started feeling sick? I’ll need to send you some of the recipes I’ve used to keep that at bay. Anne probably has some too. I’ll have to ask coordinate with her.”

“Mum doesn’t know yet,” Harry said, cutting Jay off.

"We didn't want anyone to find out yet, since it’s so early," Louis said. He finally came over to Harry’s side, pulling him down for a quick kiss. His hand drifted to Harry’s stomach and it made Harry smile. He’d been doing that all last night. "Thought we weren’t telling anyone for awhile?" He said it teasingly, all smiles and crinkled eyes as his hand slipped under Harry’s shirt to press against the bare skin of his stomach.

"Oh it wasn't Harry's fault. I sussed it out on my own. Mother's intuition. You'll know all about that soon enough, Harry."

He couldn't stop the smile that spread across his face. "I don't know about that. I couldn't exactly tell I was pregnant to begin with."

"Pssh," Jay said, waving her hand dismissively. "That doesn't mean anything. You'll realize soon enough that it's much more than just that.”

Louis nuzzled his neck. “Yeah, you’re gonna be a great mum, Haz. Don’t worry. I’ll only tease you a little in front of the sprog about not knowing you were pregnant.”

Harry flushed at the compliment and teasing. He always assumed he was going to be a good mum or dad, but it was nice to hear it coming from Jay and Louis. “Hey,” he protested half-heartedly.

“Harry, do you got a bump yet?” Phoebe asked.

Harry heard both Louis and Jay snort. The twins were just tipping over into that age where that kind of bluntness was no longer cute, but Harry was still mostly endeared to them.

“No, not yet,” he said.

Phoebe narrowed her eyes on Harry’s stomach and then reached for it, placing her hand below Louis’. “I can’t imagine you getting as big as mum. Like she was _huge_ with the babies.”

Harry jolted only a little at the new touch, mostly because Phoebe’s hands were cold. “Well for starters I don’t know if I’m having twins. Boys rarely have them,” he stopped himself from going into the science behind it, because it had been something he had been researching even before he knew he was pregnant. “But I will get pretty big once the baby starts growing.”

Phoebe frowned, pulling her hand away. Harry thought that would be the end of it, but then she placed her head against his stomach just like Louis had done the night before. Harry blinked in surprise, his hand instinctively going to her shoulder to steady her.

“Uh, Phoebe?” He looked up at Jay who seemed just as confused as him.

“Just listening for the heartbeat,” she chirped happily.

Harry couldn’t stop the smile that came to his face. “Like brother, like sister,” he muttered, sending Louis a look.

Louis huffed before gently pushing Phoebe off of Harry’s stomach. "Alright, alright. Hands off me boy. Thank you, Phoebe. What did we go over when mum was pregnant with Dottie and Ernie?"

Phoebe rolled her eyes, dropping her hand from Harry's stomach. "Don't touch people without asking first and be prepared for a no. I'm not a baby anymore, Louis ." Harry watched as she flounced over to where Daisy was sitting and pull out her phone.

"Uh oh," Harry stage-whispered, only half-afraid of what she could be doing. The twins were old enough to know the importance of secrets, and if they couldn't mention that Harry and Louis were dating then it went without saying the same would true about them having a kid. That said… sometimes accidents happened.

“Put that phone away, Phoebe,” Jay said.

“But mum, I’m just telling Fizzy!”

Harry closed his eyes in frustration. Fizzy finding out meant the news would be spread to everyone by the time they got to the car park. Fizzy meant that there was a good chance his own mum would find out from someone else than him. He should probably rectify that by telling her first.

Fuck, he was only five weeks along. He literally just found out he shouldn’t be telling _anyone_.

“No,” Jay’s voice held no room for argument. “You are not telling either of your older sisters. This is a very important secret that is Louis and Harry’s to tell. Do you understand me?” She crossed her arms, fixing both girls with a look. When neither of them answered Jay repeated herself. “Do you understand me?”

“Yes mum,” Daisy and Phoebe said at the same time.

“If I see so much as a smiley face tweet I am banning _both of you_ from any technology until this baby is five.”

Harry could only watch in awe as both girls nodded sheepishly, and Phoebe tucked away her phone. 

Louis laughed. “You still got it, mum.”

“I should bloody hope so,” she muttered, low enough that the girls didn’t hear. “Don’t you need to shower? You smell something awful.”

Louis held up his arms in surrender as he approached Harry to steal one last kiss. “I’m going, I’m going. Think about what we’re doing for dinner, could you love?”

Harry nodded. “Think I’m gonna have to see my parents, and tell them. Mum will be mad if she finds out she had to wait. And doubly mad if I tell her over the phone.”

Louis shrugged. “Doesn’t bother me, just let me know. Gotta be in bed early though.” He headed back off to the dressing room, ruffling Phoebe and Daisy’s hair as he left.

“Thanks, mum,” Harry said as Jay wrapped her arms around him. He leaned down to kiss the top of her head.

“Oh it’s nothing, love.”

“If I’m half the mum you and my mum are I’ll be happy.”

“Nonsense, you’re going to be great. Told you, it’s those maternal instincts. You’ll pick up on it soon enough.” She gave him one final squeeze before letting him go. “Call Anne, would you? It’ll be good to know I can gossip with her,” she winked as she made a shooing motion.

***

Getting his mum, dad, and Robin to agree to come to dinner at a restaurant in Manchester on such short notice without making them immediately suspicious or worried was no easy task. Harry was pretty sure he had at least managed to stop them from worrying, but that meant there was a good chance they all had guessed why the dinner was happening.

He could feel the tension in the air the moment they were sat down in a private dining room, him between Louis and his dad, Robin and his mum across from them, and all three sets of eyes were on him when he told the waiter he’d just stick to water. Louis said the same, but they knew that was because he had his game in the morning, but he didn’t have the same excuse. The silence stretched on after the waiter left them alone with their drinks, and Harry felt Louis’ knee start to bounce against his in anticipation of telling them the news. They had agreed that they would tell his parents before the food arrived.

“Well this was a nice surprise,” his mum said cutting through the silence while raising her eyebrows significantly in Harry’s direction as he took a sip from his glass of water.

Harry nodded, and after he swallowed he said, “yeah I wasn’t as busy as I thought so I flew back to see Lou’s game. Figured if we could see you all that would be even better. Sorry for the short notice though.”

“It’s alright,” his dad said, clapping him gently on the shoulder. “Just glad to see you both. And we’ll get to wish Louis luck for tomorrow.”

Louis grinned even wider. “Thanks! I’m really excited about the game.”

The silence stretched over their table again and Louis’ knee shaking got even more vigorous that Harry had to drop his hand down to stop it before it rattled the table.

He supposed now was as good a time as ever. “We uh- we also have something we want to tell you,” he said, feeling the nerves start to kick up. He knew they would be happy for them, but this was the only time he would have to tell them they would be having a first grandchild. He wanted it to be memorable, and perfect.

He made eye contact with all three of his parents, and his mum was nodding encouragingly at him, eyes bright.

“We just,” Harry felt Louis’ fingers tangle with his own and he looked down at their intertwined hands and smiled. When he looked back up at his mum, Robin, and dad he wasn’t nervous. “We’re going to have a baby.”

His mum’s reaction was instant, pushing out of her seat so she could come around the table and shower them both with kisses and hugs.

“I’m so happy for you both,” she managed to say in between kisses. “You are both going to be such wonderful parents.”

When she finally let him go he was immediately pulled into a hug by his dad. He returned the hug as he felt tears start to come to his eyes.

“You’re gonna be a great mum,” his dad whispered, squeezing him tight. “Couldn’t be happier to have such an amazing son.”

Harry nodded, starting to sniffle a little as he tried to hold back the tears. “Thanks, dad.”

The hugs continued until everyone had given them out, and the whole table was teary eyed. Harry could see the waiter hanging by the door, obviously unsure if it was safe to bring the appetizers over yet, but he let him linger until they were all seated again, and his hands were being held across the table by his mum.

They waited until after the waiter had put down the appetizers they’d ordered before his mum started peppering them with questions.

“Tell us everything,” she summed up with.

Harry laughed, rubbing the back of her hand as he looked at Louis who was absolutely glowing. “It’s very early. I just found out yesterday and we weren’t going to tell anyone until after it had been awhile, but Jay found out this afternoon and I didn’t want her to know while you three have to wait until next month.”

His mum was shaking her head. “It’s okay. We’re just a _little_ excited for you two.”

“If you need any help we’re here for you two,” Robin said.

“Thank you,” Harry said, taking a breath as he continued. “I called a doctor’s office today and I scheduled an appointment for the first week of May, so Louis and I will be in London then.”

“You’ll keep us updated?”

“Anne,” Louis said with a mock gasp, “I’m insulted. Of course we will.”

“You weren’t going to tell us you were giving us grandchildren,” she said, but it definitely sounded like teasing.

Harry squeezed her hand. “Yes, mum, we’ll tell you all about the appointment. Right now we think the baby will be due in late November or early December but we’ll know more after going to the doctor.”

“Have you started getting morning sickness?”

“Not that I’ve noticed no.”

Anne hummed in thought. “Mine was alright with you, but there were some days it was awful. And I couldn’t touch anything acidic the entire pregnancy.”

“I’ll be trying to stick to bland foods as much as possible,” Harry said.

“How’s that any different than now? Eating your rabbit food,” Louis teased, his knee knocking against Harry’s.

The conversation flowed easily after that, talking about their plans over the next couple of months, and how his parents could help them get the house ready while they were on tour. Harry felt himself start to tingle with anticipation of what this all meant, and he was glad he had Louis to share this experience with.


	2. may

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next chapters will probably not be up until Thursday but they will be coming :) Again this is unbeta'd so any mistakes are mine, and there's a bit of medical talk in the second section but nothing too descriptive.

Harry knew he needed to tell management soon that he was pregnant, and that was why he was going to London this upcoming Sunday, but he really didn’t want to. He was having one of the moments he hadn’t had in awhile where he wanted something just for him that didn’t need approval from his fucking job. None of his friends who had kids had to tell their bosses they were pregnant until after the first trimester, and here Harry was, not even at his first doctor’s appointment and already figuring out how to tell his _handlers_.

He called on his years of yoga lessons to try and center himself through deep breaths. He didn’t need to be stressed. It wasn’t good for the baby. There were reasons he needed to tell management. First, going to the doctor meant he’d needed NDAs given out to everyone in the office. Even though he’d already handled that with his lawyer management would still like to know who had NDAs. Second, the upcoming five months of touring. Third, a noticeably pregnant Harry Styles would lead to a very confused fan and public reaction. He needed PR to handle that transition.

Alright. He was going to do this.

_Hypothetically if I was pregnant what would you do?_

He sent the text to his main PR contact Michelle. He wasn’t sure what her reaction would be since she tended to drift between extreme sarcasm and no-nonsense business indifference, but that was one of the reasons he liked working with her.

His phone buzzed with a text. _Take care of it._

Harry blinked. That was… incredibly ominous. _What do you mean?_

This time the response wasn’t so instant and Harry couldn’t even see if she was typing back to him because for some reason management insisted on Blackberries for the PR team’s cellphones.

Finally, after two agonizing minutes she responded. _One of our clients can get pregnant. Do you really think there isn’t a plan in place to handle this kind of story?_

He stared at her response, unsure how to process that. He had of course known that they knew he could get pregnant. It had been one of the mandatory things he had to disclose before Syco would sign the band. The reason had been for exactly this - they needed to know about any potential problems so they could handle them. The thought of that meeting still unnerved him.

Another incoming text brought him back to the present, and the discussion on hand. _If this stops being a hypothetical I would like to know as soon as possible so I can begin to do damage control and build up the story. I will also need to know how far along you are and your plans to see if they are realistic :)_

The smiley face was meant to be friendly he’s sure, but it seemed almost mocking. She must know the answer. He dutifully confirmed what she was no doubt thinking. _I am pregnant. I’m about eight weeks along but I go to my first prenatal appointment on Monday and so I will hopefully have an exact due date soon. Even though this is early the tour will be starting up next month, and I figured you’d need time to set things up._

Michelle didn’t respond right away, and Harry tried to distract himself by scrolling through some of his other texts, but none were enough of a distraction from waiting for Michelle’s response.

Finally it got to be too much, and Harry sent a second text of, _????_

Oh god, he’d killed her. She’d had a heart attack right there at his news. Fuck.

His phone buzzed and he looked down to see Michelle had finally gotten back to him.

Oh thank god, he hadn’t given his PR rep a heart attack.

_Okay. Congratulations to you and Louis. Once you have your estimated due date we’ll be able to fully proceed. We need that to determine if you’ll need to skip the last couple of concerts, and if there will be complications with traveling to the Ireland concerts. I’ll get you a plan of action tomorrow with a set timeline for at least the coming out, and there will be a rough outline for when we’ll announce your pregnancy. Do you have any questions?_

Harry sucked in a breath, tension leaving his body. This was actually happening. Tomorrow he was going to have a date set in stone of when they would come out. His fingers shook as he responded to her text as coherently as he could. _Thank you. I don’t have any questions right now. I’ll get back to you after my appointment._ He sent the text and then bit his lip. He could leave it there but he did have one question he would love the answer to. It would give him something tangible. _Actually, can you give me a rough estimate of the dates you’re thinking about?_

She didn’t have to answer him of course, because there was a chance she didn’t know yet, so he was prepared for an answer of “no”, but instead a few minutes later he got another text.

_Rough sketch I have in mind has the four of you having together once you get back to LA. You’ll have a couple more foursome outings before the BBMAs and after that we’ll start whittling it down to three of you at a time before the tour starts. During the tour we can work on having it be just you and Louis out doing something casual. We’ll have at least until you’re 20 weeks before I feel comfortable going public with your pregnancy - 25 would be ideal if you don’t get too showy. My aim right now is to have you and Louis out and proud by mid-July and the baby announcement mid-August. Sound good?_

Harry let out a breath. Mid-July. Two months and they’d be out. _Sounds great!_

He flopped back onto the couch, finally letting the excitement hit him. This was actually happening. He needed to call Louis.

He grabbed his iPad and pulled up Facetime. He didn’t have the mental capacity to calculate the time difference, and just hoped that he caught Louis at a time he was free. He didn’t have to wait long for Louis to pick up though Harry couldn’t see much because the room he was in was dark.

“Hey Haz, gimme a second,” Louis said, voice rough with sleep.

Oh, so Harry had woken him up. He suddenly felt a little guilty as Louis turned on his bedside light. Once he situated himself back in bed Harry was finally able to see Louis looking soft and sleepy.

“Sorry, I didn’t realize you’d be sleeping.”

Louis yawned. “It’s one thirty, love. What did you think I’d be doing?”

“Aren’t you supposed to be out partying and getting papped?”

“Nope, told them to fuck off. Haven’t told them _why_ yet, but once we tell management we’re expecting, they’ll be glad I’ve bailed on this whole clubbing thing for the last week. Less of a mess to clean up.”

Harry watched Louis stretch. He was sleep ruffled, soft in the way he only was after being curled up in bed for hours. It was Harry's favorite look on Louis, and he always had to take a moment and soak in the image. Once Louis finished stretching he took his time to cuddle up on his pillow, finding the best position to see his phone screen, sleep on the pillow, and still be visible. The bottom half of his face ended up hidden by the sheets and blanket, but Harry could still see the 'go on' expression in his eyes. 

"I told Michelle today.”

“Did you?” Louis didn't have much reaction except to readjust so that Harry could see his whole face.

Harry hummed. “Yeah, that’s why I called. She said she’ll have a timeline for us tomorrow but Lou, she said we’d be out by July.”

That brought a smile to Louis’ face. “July? That’s so far away.” He laughed then, “but it’s also so close. You’ll probably be starting to show by then.” Harry nodded, feeling warm from the love he had for Louis and their child. “Lemme talk to the sprog.”

This had become a new tradition they’d established over the last two weeks. It was part of the reason Harry had called on Facetime instead of the phone. Louis insisted on saying a few words to his tummy every day. Harry was more than happy to indulge him as he tilted the iPad down and pulled up his shirt.

His stomach was still flat, though he had noticed he was starting to consistently bloat enough that his pants were snug. He needed to buy a pair in a larger size for when he left the house.

Louis cooed, and mimed petting his belly. “Hello my little sprog. Do you miss daddy? I’m so excited to see you and your mum. I bet you’re getting nice and big. Mummy is taking care of you right?”

Harry smiled softly, hand drifting to his belly to pet it. “Yeah, he is. I’ve cut back on my exercise though. Just doing yoga and some light weightlifting. I’ll need to check with the doctor about what I can and can’t do.”

Louis pursed his lips. “Any morning sickness yet?”

“No, thank fuck. Sometimes I think I’m starting to get it, but it must be all in my head. My pants don’t fit right anymore though, so I’ll probably need a new wardrobe.”

“Ellie is gonna kill you when she finds out.”

“I can wear my maternity pants on stage, been looking at the different styles and they look nice. Even got skinny jeans so the fans won’t notice a style change.” Harry was watching the way Louis’ eyes followed his hand up and down his lower belly where he assumed their child was growing. “We miss you,” he said softly.

“I miss the both of you too,” Louis said with a soft sigh. “Gonna shower the sprog in kisses when I see ‘em. And I suppose you can have a kiss or two if you want.” Harry laughed and gave Louis a two fingered salute, much to his delight. “Oi! Not in front of the sprog! Leaving a bad impression, I see.”

Harry dropped his hand back to his stomach. “They’re not paying attention right now, I already checked.” He stuck out his tongue and Louis rolled his eyes.

“If our baby comes out middle finger raised I know who to blame.”

“Yeah, you. That’s how they’ll determine paternity. ‘Born telling the world to fuck off? Must be Louis Tomlinson’s spawn.’”

“You wound me, Harold.” Louis closed his eyes. “You got any other updates for me, love?”

Harry shook his head even though Louis couldn’t see. “No, just wanted to see you and tell you about that. Excited for the appointment on Monday.”

“Me too. Think they’ll be big enough to see on the ultrasound you have to go through?”

“Hope so. Maybe we’ll be able to get a picture.”

Louis smiled, eyes still closed. “That sounds great.”

“You going back to sleep?”

“I think so, yeah.” Louis opened his eyes as he pulled the phone to his lips, smacking a kiss on the camera. “Love you both.”

Harry tilted the camera down to his tummy so it touched, and then raised the iPad to his lips to return the kiss. “We love you too. I’ll see you soon.”

“Looking forward to it.”

Louis disconnected the call and Harry smiled, hand drifting back to his belly. He looked down at it, unable to stop himself from smiling. “We’re really gonna be okay.”

***

Harry was practically buzzing out of his skin by the time his appointment came up. True to Michelle’s word he had received a timeline that confirmed their coming out date, as well as dates for every outing over the next two months they would go to in preparation. After that the timeline got a bit more fuzzy, with a tentative date scheduled for the first of September as when they would announce the pregnancy.

The entire thing left both him and Louis giddy, sharing kisses every chance they got once he was back in London. Usually sneaking into places made him feel dirty and irritable, a reminder of the closet and the costs of fame, but not even tucking his hair in a beanie and wearing the large aviators he used to obscure most of his face could stop him from feeling ecstatic. Louis and he were going to their first prenatal doctor’s appointment. Nothing could ruin his mood.

The doctor they had chosen came highly recommended from three of their male carrier friends, and the first impression Harry had of the place when they stepped into the office only reinforced that the decision they made was a good one.

The waiting room only had one other couple waiting, and they didn’t even look up from the iPad they were sharing so Harry felt safe removing his sunglasses as they went up to the reception.

“Hello,” Harry said, smiling at the older woman seated at reception. “Appointment for Tomlinson?” They’d chosen to use Louis’ last name because it wasn’t as well known, though his PA had made sure all NDAs were returned before they had gone to the actual appointment.

The receptionist smiled at them, clicking through her computer. Then she stood, letting them into through the door. “You two can wait in the examination room right over there. I just need you to fill out these forms.” She handed him a clipboard as she pointed them towards the room they could wait in.

Harry took off his beanie before he sat down on the examination chair to fill out the information sheet. He could see Louis out of the corner of his eye sit down on one of the rolling chairs and he burst into a smile as Louis spun around, arms raised. This was the father of his child.

It was a great thought.

He was halfway through filling out the sheet - generic information, his name, contact information, basic medical history - when Louis rolled over to him. There was a foot rest at the end of the examination chair so Louis couldn’t roll the whole way against the chair, but he leaned forward to fit himself between Harry’s knees as he looked at the form Harry was filling out.

“Need anything from me?” He asked.

Harry shook his head, moving the clipboard so Louis could lay on his thighs. Louis shifted, wrapping an arm around Harry’s back before he pressed a kissed on Harry’s stomach. That was his new thing, giving Harry’s stomach kisses - no giving their baby kisses. Harry didn’t know why he had been surprised the first time it had happened after he’d gotten to London. After all Louis had been miming it over Facetime for the past three weeks. 

Once Louis was settled with his head in Harry’s lap Harry put the clipboard on his face so he could finish filling out the form.

“Really?” Louis muttered from underneath the clipboard.

Harry grinned as he put a bit more pressure on the clipboard, smushing Louis’ face. “What? I need to finish this.”

Louis let out an exaggerated sigh but didn’t move from his place on Harry’s lap. They stayed like that as Harry finished filling out the form, even though Harry was pretty positive it was an uncomfortable position for Louis. He didn’t complain once and by the time Harry was finished and pulled the clipboard away from his face Louis had closed his eyes and seemed almost peaceful. Harry smiled, running his fingers through Louis’ hair.

He bent at his waist so he could kiss the side of Louis’ face, and Harry was sure they made a great picture. Maybe this could be a pose they do for a photoshoot after they come out.

Harry paused, and giggled. “Hey, Lou.”

“Yeah, babe?”

“We won’t be able to do this much longer.” Louis hummed as a question and Harry pressed another kiss to his cheek. “The baby will get in the way.”

Louis broke into a wide grin and he opened his eyes. “It will won’t it?” He pulled himself up so he could snuggle closer to Harry’s stomach, laying another kiss on the fabric of his shirt. “I love you.”

Harry smiled as he carded his fingers through Louis’ hair. “I love you too, Lou.”

There was a knock on the door that startled both of them, but Louis stayed pressed up against Harry as he called out for the person to come in.

A nurse in red scrubs poked his head in and he smiled at them when he saw how they were arranged. “Hello, finished filling out the forms?”

Slowly the two of them pulled away from each other, and Louis rolled to the side of the examination chair.

“Yup,” Harry said, picking the clipboard up to give to the nurse.

“Thank you,” the nurse said, looking over the chart. “Is this your first, Mr. Styles?” 

Harry squeezed Louis’ hand and nodded. “Yeah, and you can call me Harry.”

“Sure thing, Harry. I bet you’re excited then.”

“Only a little,” Harry said with a smile.

The nurse took it for the teasing it was. “Since it’s your first I’ll go over what you can expect from today just to calm any jitters you might have. I’m gonna do some basic check up scans: weight, height, blood pressure, and run a urine sample. I will also be drawing some blood for blood work. When Dr. Smith comes in he’ll continue with the physical which will contain a breast, pelvic, prostate, and testicular exam, a pap smear, and finally an ultrasound. He’ll also be going over any questions you have about how the next seven or so months of your life are going to be, and what you can to prepare for them. How’s all that sound?”

Harry laughed, reaching for Louis’ hand. “Like a lot, but I’m sure it’ll be worth it.”

“I promise it’s not quite as much as it seems on paper. But if dad feels like he needs to leave at any given time we won’t blame him.”

“Nah, it’s nothing I haven’t seen before so I’ll be good,” Louis said with a smile on his face. “Just let me know if you need me to move out of the way.”

The nurse smiled at Louis before beckoning Harry to stand up so they could begin. It was all routine for Harry, and he went through the motions while answering questions the nurse had.

“No morning sickness yet.”

“I’m a little tired, but I think that might just be work.”

“I do find I have to pee a lot more? But I think that might be because I’m drinking more water? I’m trying to really stay hydrated.”

The nurse made notes after every answer, nodding and smiling the whole time. It set Harry at ease because he hadn’t been _worried_ exactly, but there were little bits of nerves that he couldn’t quite get rid of. By the time the nurse finished up with him, urine sample in hand as he directed Harry back to his examination room, Louis had found a stack of pregnancy pamphlets that he was diligently reading through. Harry smiled as he shut the door, drawing Louis’ attention away from his reading.

“Are you gonna give me a show when you change into that gown?” Louis asked, nodding towards the gown on the chair.

Harry couldn’t stop the wide smile from coming to his face as he did a dorky little shimmy on his way over to Louis. It got him a laugh, and that was enough encouragement for Harry to pull off his shirt. Arms wrapped around his waist the moment it was bare and he looked down to see Louis had wheeled over to him. He watched with a fond expression as Louis pressed kisses to his naked stomach and he put his shirt on the chair. His jeans and pants followed so he was standing naked in Louis’ embrace.

It was nice being held like this with Louis showering him in kisses, and it didn’t even dip over towards sexual. It was just the two of them, so in love with the idea of their future.

“Swear you’re getting a tiny bump,” Louis whispered, fingers tracing over the laurel tattoos on his hips.

“Doubt it. I think it’s cause I haven’t worked out intensely in a couple weeks and drank my weight in water before we came here.” Louis laughed, but quickly became distracted with giving Harry slow belly rubs. Harry didn’t know what do except hug Louis close and whisper, “I’m so excited.”

“Me too,” Louis said. “Just think, it’s gonna be you and me forever.” He even managed to sing song the end of the sentence so Harry got the reference he was going for.

Harry snorted. “That’s not how the line goes. And besides, it’s not gonna be you and me forever. It’s gonna be you, and me, and this little one.”

He could see the smile stretch across Louis’ face. “Yeah. You’re right. You, me, and the sprog.”

Harry couldn’t stop himself from making a face. "Are you going to keep calling our child that?"

Louis shrugged. "Do you have a better suggestion? It's better than calling them ' the child' or ' our baby' in everyday conversation."

"It's really not," Harry said, but he found that after hearing use it every day for three weeks that he didn't mind as much as he had before.

Louis seemed to realize that Harry was only putting up a fight for show and smiled. "I'll have you using the term before the end of the first trimester. Just you watch."

"Not likely," Harry said right as someone knocked on the door. Right. He was supposed to be changing, not standing naked in the middle of the examination room. "One minute." He made quick work of changing into the gown and getting onto the examination chair so that the doctor could finally enter.

The man who entered was tall, wispy, and just starting to bald. He smiled at them as he closed the door and approached Harry and Louis. “Hello, I’m Dr. John Smith, pleasure to meet you.”

Harry shook his hand. “I’m Harry, this is my partner Louis.”

Dr. Smith shook hands with Louis and then settled onto the other rolling chair, looking at the chart. Harry had to wonder just how much information those things held for people to keep looking at them. “Congratulations, by the way. First time parents?”

"Yes, sir," Harry said.

"That's always exciting. Andrew told you what you should be expecting today, correct?"

Harry assumed Andrew was the nurse. "Yes he did. Sounded like every test I've ever gone through for a physical with an added ultrasound."

Dr. Smith chuckled. "That's correct. If Louis here feels like he's getting a bit too bored during the exam he's free to wait outside at any point and I'll be sure to call him back in for the important bit."

"Nah, I'm sure I'll be fine. Like I told the nurse, nothing I haven't seen before."

"Well, just know that the option is there, and no one will judge you." Dr. Smith didn't seem all that bothered as he flipped to the next page on the chart. "Now just a few more questions we'll go over before we start on the physical. It says here that you might need to be a bit flexible with appointments?”

“Yeah, we’re sorta in a band, and we’ll be touring through the end of October.” Harry said. It wasn’t like he assumed everyone knew who he was - Niall got kicked out of enough bars to keep them all humble.

“Ah yes, my niece is a fan.” Dr. Smith was still smiling at them. “Hopefully this pregnancy will be as smooth as possible. So far you seem to be in remarkable shape.”

“I get sick really easily, so I do what I can.”

“Well then the timing of your pregnancy is probably really good, since you’ll hopefully miss flu season, and you won’t be able to get the shot until after the baby is born. But as for flexibility, I’ll try what I can. You might want to hire a private nurse to stay with you. We don’t have to decide now, though. Just food for thought.”

"We'd talked about that actually," Harry said. "We'll be in London in June so unless there are early complications we think we'll be fine with just a single doctor until after that."

"Hopefully there aren't any complications." Dr. Smith smiled at both of them and put his chart down. "Now we'll start with a breast exam and work our way down, how does that sound?" He waited for Harry to nod in agreement before he had him lie back and open the front of the gown.

Harry stared at the ceiling as Dr. Smith pressed at each of his pectorals, rubbing in slow circles from the nipple outwards to check for lumps. He could feel Louis watching them and he could only imagine what was going through his mind. Probably sending constant prayers that everything was going to come back okay. Harry didn't share those exact sentiments, since he was pretty confident he was healthy, but he could see where Louis' worry came from.

Dr. Smith moved on from his chest wordlessly, pressing his hands to Harry's stomach next. "I'm feeling for your uterus right now, making sure nothing feels off," he said as he looked down at what his hands were doing. "You mentioned that you think you're about eight weeks along, right?" Harry nodded, and Dr. Smith hummed.

“Why? What’s the matter?” Louis asked as he leaned forward, frowning.

“Nothings the matter. I just think you’re probably further along than you thought.” He gave them a soothing smile. “Your uterus is pushed further up than I would expect for eight weeks. We’ll be able to confirm for sure once we do the ultrasound.” He pulled his hands away. 

Harry heard some clanging down by his feet and when he glanced down he saw Dr. Smith had pulled out the stirrups for his feet. "Pap smear time?"

"Pap smear time," Dr. Smith confirmed, grabbing the wrapped kit from the counter. "I'll need you to scootch to the very edge - yup just like that. Just gotta do these final exams and we can move onto the ultrasound."

The remaining exams were as routine as everything else had been, though they were made a bit less uncomfortable by Louis constantly making silly faces whenever Harry caught his eye.

"Everything looks good to me," Dr. Smith said. "We'll call you about the blood work and pap results in a couple days but in the preliminary we are looking at a healthy pregnancy so far."

Harry was surprised at how relieved he felt hearing that. A look at Louis told him that he wasn't alone in that feeling.

“So let’s see if we can find your baby,” Dr. Smith said. “Now, usually this is where I warn you that you probably won’t see much this go around, because at eight weeks the baby is very small. However since I think you’re further along than that there is a chance you will see something. If that’s the case we might not need to schedule you for another ultrasound so early in June like I was planning. But we’ll see. Flexibility, right?”

Harry nodded, leaning back so Dr. Smith could begin to prep for the ultrasound. The nurse from before - Andrew - poked his head back in. “Ready for me?”

“Right on time.” He turned his attention back to Harry. “This will take about twenty or so minutes to finish, and I’ll try not to talk to the whole time, but I will explain what I’m seeing.”

The set up time was almost nerve wrecking, Dr. Smith and Andrew both essentially ignoring Harry and Louis while they prepped the machine and then Harry's stomach, but soon Dr. Smith was rubbing the wand over his flat tummy. It took a couple of moments for an image to be transmitted to the screen, but when it did all Harry saw was grey and white lines and blobs. Something was there though, because Dr. Smith made a triumphant sound.

“Ah, there we go. One tiny little baby. Congratulations. Judging by the size I’d put you safely at eleven weeks.” He pointed with his left hand towards the screen, tracing some shape out.

Harry couldn’t tell where the baby was even with the pointing, and he knew Louis couldn’t either, but he squeezed Louis’ hand anyway in excitement. “Bit further along than we were expecting,” Harry muttered to Louis, who shrugged, eyes fixed on the monitor. "And it gives you less time to convince me to call our baby 'the sprog'."

That brought a huge smile to Louis' face and he looked away from the screen to look at Harry. "I'll still win."

Dr. Smith continued on without acknowledging their banter. “Yes, with male carriers it can be harder to determine without an ultrasound since there’s usually no menstruation to help you pinpoint ovulation, but I’d guess you conceived somewhere around the first week of March.”

Louis looked back at the monitor. “Sounds like it could fit. We were on tour at the time and I’m not sure either of us quite remember which days were what.”

Harry frowned as he remembered something. "Yeah, but Lou, wasn't I still drinking that early?" He'd stopped drinking after he started having too much pain and he'd had to start taking pain killers, but if he'd been pregnant that early... He caught Dr. Smith's eye and clarified quickly. "I stopped in the middle of March when I started taking some pain medicine, and then I found out I was pregnant so I haven't picked it back up, but the first couple weeks of March I was still drinking pretty regularly. You don't think that'll be a problem, do you?"

Dr. Smith shook his head. "You should be fine. And before you start worrying, there's a good chance the medicine you took haven't had any detrimental effects either. I don't suggest you take anymore without consulting me first, but most of the complications would show in the first trimester, and since you're almost out of that I'd brand you safe."

"That's a relief," Harry said, mind still going over everything he could have done wrong those first couple weeks of March while he didn't know he was pregnant and wasn't on pain medicine yet.

"I think your worry is warranted but it's nothing to stress about. We can set up appointments for testing if you'd like, just to doubly ease your mind."

Harry looked at Louis, biting his lip. "Yeah, that would make me feel better. Just first parent jitters."

"Nothing wrong with that," Louis said, squeezing his hand. "The tests aren't a problem. We'll make time for them." He leaned over to drop a kiss on Harry's cheek.

“Now the fun part. Since you’re at eleven weeks would you like to hear the heartbeat?”

Harry felt his eyes widen and he didn't even need to look at Louis to know the expression was mirrored on his face. "Yes," he breathed out, Louis echoing him a moment later.

"Let me just finish up this ultrasound. I'll be able to tell you if there are any physical anomalies right now."

Harry closed his eyes and took a few breaths. He was officially passed the point of excited. This was real. They were having a baby, him and Louis. This was the ultimate happiness he decided.

Louis nudged him so he would open his eyes and when he did Louis nodded to the screen. "Hey, Doc, can you point out where the sprog is so we'll know what we're showing people?"

Dr. Smith nodded and this time when he showed them where their baby was he did it slower. "We have a head here, and right down here we have what will be the feet very soon. Exciting, isn't it?"

"You have no idea," Louis said, leaning as far forward as he could while staying in his seat. "Wow, that's actually in you right now, Haz."

"I know. Sorta nuts, isn't it?"

"Nuts? A miracle of nature more like."

"Alright, heartbeat time." This time the wait was a lot shorter, and soon a rapid pitter-patter was coming through the speakers of the monitor.

“It’s so fast,” Harry whispered.

Dr. Smith nodded. “It’s going at about 170 beats per minute right now. It’ll slow down in a couple weeks, but it’ll still be going pretty fast. It’s the sign of a good, healthy heart.”

“Can we have a recording of this?” Louis asked.

If Dr. Smith thought it was a strange request he didn’t show it. “We can do that for you, of course.”

Harry finally looked away from the monitor to focus his gaze on Louis. Louis however only had eyes for Harry's stomach, staring at it in awe. Harry could only imagine what was going through his mind at that moment. He squeezed Louis' hand, and it brought an even bigger smile to Louis' face.

"This is really happening, Haz."

"Yeah, yeah it is." He couldn't be happier, and he was pretty positive Louis couldn't either.

***

“This is so sick,” Niall said once they were seated on the outdoor patio.

It was the middle of May and they were at a restaurant in Malibu having their first band outing in years. There was a current of positive energy flowing between all four of them at the idea, and even though Niall and Liam didn’t know yet that Harry’s expecting, they knew that on July 14th the cover of People’s Magazine would be Louis and Harry’s coming out exclusive. (Barring a bigger story that comes out that week in which case Michelle has said their story would be pushed back a week)

“I’m ordering a round of shots,” Niall announced as he shut his menu and tossed it in Liam’s direction.

“I’m not drinking,” Harry said, and he braced himself for the accusatory look, but Niall just shrugged.

“Louis can drink yours then. Hey Cal!” Niall called, hands cupped over his mouth to act as a megaphone. “You want nachos?!”

Harry looked behind him to see Cal standing on the sidewalk with his camera up, and he gave a little wave. Cal put down the camera and sighed. “Can you four amateurs just pretend I’m not here for five minutes so I can get some pictures of your ugly mugs for the internet?”

That got a laugh from all four of them, and Harry felt Louis’ knee press against his thigh. Harry knew he was beaming and when he looked at Louis he saw it mirrored in his face. He let himself grab Louis’ hand for a second, knowing that if it got photographed by Cal he would just delete it.

"Want a smoke, Tommo?" Liam asked, pulling a pack of cigarettes and a lighter out.

Louis grimaced and Harry frowned. There wasn't much of a breeze today so there was a good chance Harry wouldn't breathe anything in, and even then, being next to someone while they smoked shouldn't be too bad for the baby.

"I'm trying to cut back actually," Louis said.

"What?" Liam asked.

"What?" Harry echoed him, because this was the first time he had heard of Louis cutting back.

"What?" Niall said, probably just to be a dick because he was buried in his phone. "We're gonna take a selfie, by the way. _Before_ we get too drunk to look unrespectable. Just letting you lads know."

"Liam's not a lad," Louis said on reflex.

"Stop avoiding the question," Harry said, nudging Louis' shoulder. "You're quitting? Or like- cutting back?"

Louis gave him a look that involved raised eyebrows before he turned back to Liam. "Yeah, for me health you know? And so it'd probably be best if you didn't smoke around me. Triggering and all."

Liam was looking at him weirdly but put the pack of cigarettes away. "Yeah, you know that's probably like a good idea. Shouldn't smoke."

"That shit'll kill you," Niall piped up.

"Oi, don't throw stones, or whatever the saying is," Liam said, throwing his lighter into Niall's lap.

Niall seemed unimpressed. "Why did I think it was a good idea to go out with your jackasses again? What do I get in return for offering you my day off? Objects thrown at me. I want a fucking refund."

Louis laughed, but Harry was still stuck on him quitting. Because it was finally catching up to him why Louis was doing it. Or at least Harry was pretty sure he knew why and if he was right that was... really sweet.

Would it be in poor taste to kiss Louis right now?

Harry looked around the empty patio, and then glanced over to where Cal was finishing up.

_Fuck it._

He leaned over and laid a big kiss on Louis' cheek, wrapping his arms around him. "I love you."

Louis reached up and squeezed his forearm, moving it a bit from where his arm was touching Louis' chest. "Love you too."

Harry pulled away quickly, suddenly remembering the new tattoo Louis had. It was mostly healed by now, over a week old and relatively small, but it was still at that stage where Louis was probably getting sense memory of it being there.

He looked over at Liam and Niall to see if they had noticed how quick Harry had moved but both of them were distracted looking at the menu and their phone respectively.

"Those two are so weird," Liam muttered to Niall.

"Don't know why we love them."

Harry shook his head and looked back at Louis who was patting the tattoo. Even though it was new Harry already had it memorized since he'd been staring at it every chance he could after Louis had gotten it. It was a soundwave of their baby's heartbeat, right underneath the 78 and over Louis' heart. Harry felt a momentary jolt of jealousy, because he would have gotten a matching one in the same place if he'd been able to. For now he had to settle with staring at it in envy.

"Will you two stop making moon-eyes at each other and look at the fucking menus?" Niall asked.

Louis flipped him off. "Keep up that attitude and I'm gonna stand up and leave. Cal already got the pics so there's no need to have the rest of this dinner."

Niall flipped his off right back. “Come on, we’re celebrating! We’re a band, we get to be seen together again, you two are coming out in a couple months, I’m unable to show my face at professional golfing events, and Liam is gonna pay for this all because he’s our band daddy.”

Harry couldn’t stop the laugh that bubbled up, but at least he was in good company because Louis snorted so hard water came out of his nose. He reached over to rub Louis’ back while grabbing a napkin from the middle of the table.

“You two wanna share with the class?” Liam asked.

“No, it’s just, you’re gonna be calling me daddy soon,” Louis said as he wiped his mouth and nose.

Harry watched for Liam and Niall’s reaction, waiting to see if the ball would drop, but it never seemed to come. Niall’s lip curled and Liam facepalmed and neither of those were proper reaction to news that Harry was pregnant.

His bandmates were a little oblivious.

“Fuck you, Tommo,” Niall snapped, “Leave your kinky bedroom shit in the bedroom. You know what, just for that I’m drinking Harry’s beer _and_ his shot.”

Liam laughed, high-fiving Niall, but Harry just smiled at Louis. They’d tell them later.


	3. june

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> See, I told you Thursday and it's still sorta Thursday in some parts of the world! :)
> 
> Unbeta'd still so all mistakes are mine. Next chapter will be up by the weekend!

In retrospect there were probably one hundred different ways to tell Niall and Liam about Harry's pregnancy, and they had definitely opted for the worst. But honestly Louis couldn't even be bothered because he was too hyped from their latest doctor's visit. Harry was safely at week fifteen, and even though he still hadn't developed a bump just yet it was only a matter of time before he was proper showing.

They had a second sonogram - male carrier pregnancies needed a few extra to make sure enough space was there for the developing baby - and confirmed that Harry and the Sprog were as healthy as could be. They were having their first concert of the European leg of the tour tonight, and in thirty nine days he was going to be gracing the cover of a magazine alongside the love of his life announcing that they were together.

So he could be excused for how he stuck his head in the common room that was set up in Millennium Stadium and called out, "Niall! Liam! Emergency band meeting! Me and Haz's!"

He pulled out his phone as he left the common room and texted Lottie to gather the main crew in front of their dressing room in about ten minutes. Liam and Niall filed in behind him, both looking a little pale. Harry was seated on one of the couches, a print out of their latest sonogram in his hand, though he tipped it back so Niall and Liam couldn't see what it was. The two boys were practically wooden as they sat down across from Harry.

"Hey!" Harry said, looking up with a smile.

Niall and Liam both gave muttered responses and it clicked for Louis why they were acting that way.

"We have good news!" He announced.

The change was immediate: Liam melted into the couch while Niall fell forward, forehead resting against his knee.

"Oh thank fucking christ," Niall said, voice muffled by his thighs.

Harry blinked and looked at Louis. "What did you think? We were gonna have bad news?"

Liam rubbed a hand over his face. "No offense but the last time we had an 'emergency band meeting' Zayn told us he was _leaving_ leaving."

Louis winced when Harry cut a playful glare to him. "In my defense, I delivered the words 'emergency band meeting' with incredible pep."

Harry facepalmed with the sonogram. "Yes! It's good news! No one is leaving the band."

"One might even say we are _adding_ a member."

Harry gave Louis another look, but Louis was more focused on the confused looks Liam and Niall were wearing.

"What the hell are you two talking about?" Niall asked.

Harry took over after beckoning Louis to come sit beside him. Louis did so with flourish, resting his hand on Harry's stomach. Harry's hand joined his after a moment. "I'm pregnant," Harry said with a smile. When he was met with stunned silence he continued. "I'm fifteen weeks, and the due date is November 25th."

Louis watched the awe settle on both of their faces, and it was only one more moment before Niall launched himself on them with a scream.

"Holy fucking congratulations!" He showered both of their faces with kisses, making sure to be extra gentle with Harry. When he turned to Louis, however, he grabbed him by both shoulders and violently shook him. "Tommo is going to be a fucking father, holy shit! Hazza is gonna blow up like a fucking balloon with a baby!"

Louis burst out laughing even as he started to get dizzy. "Yes! Yes I am! And yes! Yes Harry is! Calm down Nialler!"

"Calm down?! Are you fucking kidding me? You and Harry managed to somehow make a little kid! This calls for booze and a party! Except not for Harry - Wait! That's why you didn't want to drink!" Niall let go of Louis to turn to Harry.

Except Louis could see that Liam had Harry wrapped in a hug and was rocking them both gently with an incredibly fond look on his face. "I'm so happy for both of you. This is so exciting. If there is anything, _anything_ I can do for you just let me know."

Seeing Liam so calm seemed to calm Niall down, or at least redirect his energy because instead of interrogating Harry he took off for the door like a shot, and swung it open. "Someone needs to find my phone and tweet AAAAAAAAAAAHHH right this second! No questions asked!" Niall screamed into the hallway.

Louis' laughter only grew when Liam joined Niall. "Me too! Mine is in the rec room with Sophia!"

Louis turned to Harry and pressed a kiss to his cheek. "Think we'll be able to tweet too? Just something small?"

Harry grinned and pulled out his phone. "Yeah, I have just the thing." He types something out quickly in his twitter, before switching to Louis' account to make his tweet as well. "What do you think?" He showed Louis both drafts.

"Yeah. That's good."

  
  
  


Once the tweets were sent for approval and they were all settled back into the couch Niall demanded to know everything, while Liam was interested in the logistics of how their team was going to handle this.

"Of course they know. Had to tell them first thing because of the NDAs we gave to the doctor."

"What about the rest of the crew? Is Harry gonna be able to stay on tour with us the whole way?"

Harry nodded. "Right now that's what we think. I'll be eight months pregnant when we do the last show but if I keep like stress at bay and what not the doctor doesn't think I'll have any problems."

"That's all subject to change at a moment's notice of course," Louis cut in. "But for now that's the plan."

Liam looked like he wanted to say more, but he seemed to decide against it. He probably realized it would be a bit too rude, talking work like this when they had just announced happy news. Louis wanted to give him a cookie as a reward, but he settled for gracing Liam with a winning smile.

"When you gonna tell the crew?" Niall asked.

"Today actually. Just wanted you two to know first. You're the first after our families, and management, to know."

"We feel suitably honored, and not at all offended that you waited until now to tell us instead of telling us at lunch a couple weeks ago which made us think you two were planning on making us watch you have kinky sex," Niall said as deadpan as he could.

Liam stared at Niall in vague horror before whipping his head to stare at Harry and Louis with wide eyes. "We didn't think that!" He swung his head back to Niall. "Don't tell them things like that!"

Louis laughed. "Don't deny it too hard there, Payno."

"Yeah, _Payno_ ," Harry said with an evil grin as he theatrically threw his leg over Louis' lap. "You don't need to deny that you want to watch us. We understand. We have a mirror in our bedroom for that exact reason."

Louis somehow managed to calm his laughing enough that he was making a straight face when he reached over and groped Harry's bum while looking Liam directly in the eye. "We'd be more than happy to have you watch. We have nothing to be ashamed of."

Liam buried his face in Niall's shaking shoulder, but Louis could still hear him ask, "why are you such an arse?"

Harry lit up, and Louis smirked, knowing Harry had thought of something brilliant. His boy was so smart. "Well Liam, you know what they say! You are what you eat!"

Louis and Niall both burst out laughing.

Louis could tell that Liam was trying to stop himself from laughing as well. He was trying to go for a stern mask but it kept slipping the longer Niall and Louis kept laughing, and Louis knew it was only a matter of time before he broke.

Liam stood up. "You keep being mean to me, I'm gonna make you regret it."

Harry snorted, and leaned his head towards Louis as if he were going to share a secret. "Liam won't do anything, he's a pussy."

Louis knew that was his set up. "But he doesn't eat it!"

That sent Niall into another fit of laughter and Louis was honestly worried he was going to become permanently red.

Liam pointed his finger both of them, grin starting to show on his face. "You two are going to be awful parents. And for that comeback I'm gonna go tell everyone you're having a baby and ruin your announcement."

He took off for the door and Louis had to scramble to chase after him. He knew Liam wouldn't actually say anything (right?), but it was all part of the banter. He made it to the door right as Liam had opened it, and promptly ran into his back.

"The fuck?" He stumbled back and only then did he register the massive group of people waiting outside in the hallway. Louis blinked, seeing the fond (and few exasperated) looks the members of their core crew were giving him and Liam. "Uh?"

His eyes settled on Lottie who was positively vibrating with excitement and suddenly he remembered. Oh yeah.

"I got everyone together!" Lottie said unhelpfully, waving her hands around as if he didn't notice everyone.

Harry and Niall appeared behind him and Liam jogged over to where Andy and Sophia were standing. Niall slipped away as well, falling in besides his mother - which oh yeah, Maura _was_ here early to see him.

"Oh," Harry said with a smile as he wrapped his arm around Louis' shoulder. "Hello." There were a chorus of greetings and Louis looked apologetically at Harry. He'd forgotten to mention this to him, but Harry didn't seem too bothered. "We just wanted to make a quick announcement before the tour starts, so sorry for taking you away from your jobs for a few minutes." He was smiling now, wide and proud. "Louis and I expecting a baby!"

Louis wasn't sure if the eruption of noise was because of everyone's excitement or if it was because the acoustics of the hallway made the large group of people sound even louder. He didn't have time to think about it though because everyone began to shower them with congratulations.

It was a blur of faces as the crew made some semblance of a line to go through giving both he and Harry hugs and kisses. Louis lost track of who was saying what to him by the third person and he regretfully became a repeat of hugs, kisses, "thank you", "we're so incredibly excited", and "fifteen weeks".

The crowd was dwindling down when Lottie cupped her hands over her mouth and shouted, "by the way I'll be running all the official pools regarding the birth of my niece or nephew! There will be sheets to fill out outside the makeup trailer, but I'll be keeping track of everything in a spreadsheet online! We're gonna have a gender, due date, and name pool! See me or Lou T for details! Thank you!"

Louis gave her a fond look. He could hear Lou and Harry picking up their conversation again now that Lottie's announcement was over (she was asking about his morning sickness. he was telling her he hadn't had any) and he thanked one of the last people still hanging around: Tim the stage director who also gave him a stern warning about surprise announcements so early to show time. Once that was over he turned his full attention to Lottie.

"What's this about you betting on the Sprog?"

Lottie giggled as she hugged him. "Most of the money is going to charity. Like, I have it all planned out. Half the money raised from all of them will go to charity, and then some is going to go towards the baby gift from all of us on the crew, and the only time people would actually see winnings is a small percentage from guessing the due date and the name."

Louis didn't actually care about the logistics, though he knew he was going to make Niall and Liam guess a bunch of times on the names just to be funny. He sighed. "You lot are ridiculous."

She grinned at him. "Hey, so since you've told everyone on the crew does that mean me and Fizzy can vague tweet about this now?"

"Uh...," Louis thought about the tweets he and the boys had sent out just minutes earlier. "Yeah, why not. Just keep it vague. I don't need Fizzy posting something like 'I love adding family members'."

Lottie was smiling as she pulled away to tweet. He wasn't sure that was the best move and he'd probably field a few stern messages from PR about reminding his family to stay calm, but it was worth it.

He looked at Harry who was practically glowing under the attention from Lou and Ellie.

Definitely worth it.

  
  
  


***

Louis had been trying to avoid this conversation for the past two months. Mostly because he knew he was being stupid and ridiculous and there was a large part of him that was hoping he would just get over it, but the other part was that it was very easy to avoid the conversation. At first it was because Harry and he weren't in the same place, and then when they did meet up again it just never came up. They were incredibly flexible and it extended to all parts of their life, especially their sex life. Which meant that it wasn't _that_ out of character if he didn't actually fuck Harry for over a month. They had other ways to get each other off after all.

But... that said, when Harry asked specifically for something Louis never denied him. Ever.

"What's the matter?" Harry asked from beneath him, green eyes wide.

They'd been making out in their bed, a movie playing low in the background more for the soundtrack than to actually watch, and it was good. Louis had even rolled on top of Harry, and he'd been letting his hips do a slow grind against Harry's, feeling both of their cocks get hard. And then Harry had moaned, "want you inside me," and he'd froze.

Which was not his normal reaction to that request, which explained Harry's response.

Louis stared back at him. "Uh."

Harry's eyebrows furrowed as he gently pushed Louis off of him. "What's going on?" He glanced down and it was only then that Louis realized he'd gone embarrassingly soft.

"Uh, I can explain?"

"Alright." Harry rolled over onto his side. He looked Louis in the eye as he waited for Louis to explain.

_Shit._

"I'm having a crisis."

"A crisis? Okay," Harry said, dragging the word out.

Louis could tell he was trying to be supportive and understanding despite probably being completely in the dark. He took a deep breath and tried to explain what he was feeling. "Yes. See I love you very much, and I'm _incredibly_ excited we're having a kid together," he paused to try and figure out how to segue into the next part.

"Two things I never had any doubts about."

Louis licked his lips and nodded. "So it's not that I don't find you unattractive or like anything like that. You're gorgeous, and sexy, and-"

"Lou, stop trying to spare my feelings or whatever and just tell me what the problem is," Harry said, firm but gentle.

He took a deep breath and just let it tumble out. "I can't fuck you cause I'm freaked out about the Sprog."

"Freaked...out? You know you aren't actually big enough to penetrate my cervix, right? I don't even think I'm big enough to theoretically penetrate someone's cervix."

Louis gave a full body shudder as he shook his head. "No! I know that, thank you for that mental image, but no, it's not like - it's come." He could feel Harry staring at him and when he looked at him he saw Harry was trying to hold back a laugh. He sighed. "The idea of getting jizz on our child really bothers me, okay."

And Harry, because he was a sane person and not at all messed up like Louis, just calmly blinked as he absorbed that and then asked, "so do you want to wear a condom?"

"No!" Louis said as a kneejerk before immediately retracting it. "I mean yes. Maybe that will help. At least until I get over this mental hurdle because like I _do_ still find you insanely attractive, and the idea of fingering you, or giving you orgasms doesn't bother me it's just the..." he trailed off.

"Coming in me that bothers you," Harry finished for him.

Louis sighed and nodded. "Yeah. Sorry."

Harry waited a moment and then climbed out of bed. "I'll go grab some condoms from the guest bathroom then, unless... you don't want to continue? We don't have to if it makes you that uncomfortable."

Louis collapsed back in pillows and rubbed his face with his hands. "No, I do. Just worried I won't be able to stay hard. You know, normal 23 year old worries."

Harry laughed at him, and all Louis could do in retaliation was throw one of the pillows in his general direction. It landed far away from where Harry had gotten off to. "I'm sure this is something that crosses a lot of fathers' minds, and maybe a few mums too. And hey, at least you aren't irrationally worried it'll hurt the baby, so you're one step ahead in some regards."

"I googled that, actually." He could hear Harry sigh. "The first time all I got were links to pregnant porn. Apparently that's like a niche or something."

Harry laughed again. "On that note I'm gonna find the condoms. Maybe try and be naked for me by the time I get back."

Louis watched as Harry left the room and then he stripped. He was still soft which was incredibly embarrassing, though he was thankful that Harry was taking this all in good humor. He got back on the bed, situating himself so he was leaning against the pillows in the middle of the bed. He closed his eyes, thinking about Harry.

It was easy now that the pressure of sex was removed to start to tease himself again. He hadn't been lying to Harry; he still found him ridiculously gorgeous and sexy. Even more so now that he was pregnant with his child. He wasn't sure there was a reality where he wouldn't be attracted to Harry.

"That's better," Harry said from the doorway.

Louis opened his eyes, hand finally wrapping around his cock now that it was fully hard. Harry was smirking, condoms in one hand. He'd taken the initiative already to undress and so he was naked, cock heavy in between his legs.

Louis moaned, thumbing the slit of his cock. "Come here, gorgeous."

That made Harry beam, and he did a little twirl to show off his figure. He was finally soft around his hips, and the bump was definitely noticeable when he was shirtless. 

Louis watched as Harry dropped the strip of condoms near the edge of the bed before he climbed up and settled his way in between Louis' thighs. He dropped his hand, prepared for Harry to take over. He was starting to feel that rush of hormones that made him fuzzy and happy. Harry wrapped his hand around Louis' cock, stroking up and down while he settled himself on Louis' lap.

"Love you," he whispered.

It brought a smile to Louis' lips and he leaned up to kiss Harry. "Love you too."

He put one hand on Harry's hip to steady him as he let the other one travel over his soft stomach. Harry giggled against his mouth.

"Tickles."

Louis kissed him again to distract him from the tickling sensation. Once Harry was absorbed in the kiss he trailed his fingers further down, running over Harry's cock and balls with a gentle caress. Harry gasped into the kiss.

"Okay?" Louis asked, mouth a hair breadths away from Harry's.

Harry nodded.

Louis sunk two fingers inside him. He was loose and wet already, and Louis curled his fingers to make him squirm right as he leaned over to bite one of Harry's nipples.

Harry keened, rocking his hips against Louis' fingers. He was pushing his chest closer, trying to get Louis to give him more attention, which Louis was more than happy to do. He sucked until Harry's nipple was hard and red, and Harry was a whimpering mess right above him.

"So sensitive," he whispered once he pulled away, blowing cool air on his nipple to watch his shudder.

Harry just whined, tugging at his hair until he gave the same treatment to the other nipple. He used his teeth and his tongue, biting and then soothing. He added a third finger inside Harry, giving him more to rock against until he was gasping out, "I'm gonna come- fuck I'm gonna come."

Louis moaned around his nipple, curling his fingers until he felt Harry shudder around him, and come splatter on his chest and stomach. Harry went limp in his grasp, hands falling out of his hair to rest on his shoulders in an attempt to keep himself upright. Louis removed his fingers from inside Harry carefully, moving so he had both hands gripping the meat of Harry's hips.

"Gonna fuck you now, alright, baby?" Louis said as he pulled away from Harry's nipple.

Harry nodded, eyes a bit glazed over. "Lemme grab a condom." He was a bit uncoordinated as he leaned back, reaching for the condoms at the end of the bed. He ripped one off and opened it, climbing back into Louis' lap so he could put the condom on.

Louis grunted as Harry's wrapped around the base of his cock, and settled his hands back on Harry's hips to help steady him. After the condom was on Harry was sinking down and Louis had to grip his hips harder. He could feel how warm he was through the condom. It was intoxicating and Louis wanted to buck up into it.

But he held back. He was going to go slow. Let Harry dictate the pace.

He started slow, rising up with his thighs before sinking back down.

Louis gasped and dug his nails into Harry's hips. A month was a lot longer than he had thought, and he'd missed this. He missed watching Harry like this. Harry was focused as he rode him, making sure he felt every drag of the cock inside him.

There was one good thing about the slow pace; it let him truly admire Harry. He loved admiring Harry. Harry was gorgeous after all. And like this he could take in his flushed face, and the way the muscles in his arms, chest, and abs contracted as he moved up and down.

His abs were softer now though, and the bump was new. The bump was nice.

Louis slipped his hand up from Harry's hips so he could spread his thumbs just enough to rub against his belly.

Harry moaned, and started working his hips harder. It invited Louis to join in, to meet each roll of Harry's hips instead of passively taking it. Both of them were chasing their orgasms now and Louis' mind was suddenly blessedly blank from any thought that wasn't how good Harry felt riding him.

"So good, so good," Harry kept saying as his fingers dug into Louis' shoulders, probably leaving indentations.

"You're telling me," Louis grunted. He thrust his hips up, trying to get more leverage. He loved the feeling of fucking Harry and while he wished he could do this forever he was getting close. "I'm so close."

Harry nodded, eyes squeezed shut as he dropped a hand from Louis' shoulder so he could wrap it around his cock. "Me too."

Louis grinned and leaned up to press their lips together. It was messy and uncoordinated as they both were so close to the edge but it didn't matter. It wasn't the first time they clanged teeth together and it wouldn't be the last.

Louis felt the warmth in his belly coil tighter and tighter until he gave one final thrust and came hard, gasping against Harry's lips. Harry moaned, falling forward so he could cling to Louis as he too fell over the edge, coming for the second time all over Louis' chest.

They'd have to clean that up.

Harry pulled himself off of Louis and curled up to his side. Louis took off the condom and tied it off before remembering he didn't have a rubbish bin on his side of the bed.

"Need you to toss this out."

Harry grunted but took the condom and rolled over to throw it out. Once that was done he curled back up against Louis' side. "How was that?" He asked around a yawn.

Louis grinned and kissed his forehead. "Like you don't know how amazing you are."

Harry was smiling when he pulled away to settle back against the pillows. "But I love hearing about it. Tell me I'm amazing. It feeds my ego."

"You're amazing. I don't know what I'd do without you."

"Drown in the pile of takeout boxes and dirty laundry that you'd accumulate trying to live on your own."

Louis snorted and kissed him again. "You're such a dick."

Harry yawned. "I am what I eat."

"Oh my god. That joke is two weeks old why are you pulling it out on me now?"

"Comedic timing."

Louis contemplated shoving Harry to the side but all it took was one look at him and he knew he couldn't do it. Even as a joke. So he just pulled him closer, kissed his forehead, and tried not to think about why the mother of his child was such a loser.


	4. july

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Still only beta'd by myself.
> 
> Next chapter will be up soon :)

Louis’ biggest worry in life had quickly become that something would happen to Harry or the Sprog. They were officially _on tour_ , unlike the European tour where they got to fly home every night. They were in America, away from their doctor, and their families. His mum was staying with them in LA but she didn’t fly to the shows with them, and once they moved to Chicago she was going to fly home and they would be alone.

Anne had offered to fly out but she was the main contact for the company they had baby proofing their house, as well as their interior decorator who was going to put together a hopefully perfect nursery. They had done what they could while they were still in Europe but there were a lot of decisions they’d put off that would hopefully be figured out by the time they permanently returned in the middle of September.

This left Louis alone to worry about Harry’s well being every single moment he wasn’t in Louis’ sight. They weren’t going to announce the pregnancy for another month, which meant that any fan meeting had the potential for turning disastrous. Meet and greets were normally fine because they were controlled, but they were going out now, together, to be seen. And sometimes they met fans because it was more authentic than constantly getting papped at lunches.

It was all part of the coming out process but it wasn’t the safest option when there was a baby on board. But Louis tried to keep his cool in most of those situations, because there was security and it was security’s job to keep both of them safe. They weren’t being put out there to be mobbed, so he tried to be chill. It was better for everyone involved.

So while Louis was prepared to be calm around other people what he hadn’t taken into consideration until it happened was the danger Harry was in from just being himself.

He’d been minding his own business on stage, singing along almost robotically because it was at that mid-show slump where he was relegated to the side stage so he could regain his energy for the finale. For all the off stage interaction he and Harry were doing for some reason stage interaction was still a no go, so he was pointedly not looking at Harry as he danced around just down the stage from him. This was the last show he would have to do this for anyway, he reminded himself.

They were coming out on Tuesday.

Not looking at Harry never worked though, and he could see Harry dragging the mic up and down his section, prancing and strutting until suddenly he wasn’t.

He wasn’t because he’d fallen.

He’d fallen with a pretty loud thud.

Louis’ heart leapt into his throat right as the band stopped playing, and Liam and Niall’s heads whipped around to see what had happened.

He froze. His mind was whirling, playing over his orders not to interact and how that was diametrically opposed to what his heart was screaming he should be doing. Liam ran over to Harry, blabbering in his mic to cover the silence that had overtaken the stadium.

This was all new territory that would no doubt be poured over by media and fandom alike. Louis couldn’t even remember the number of tumbles they all had taken over the years and the fact was they had _never_ stopped mid-song.

But this was different.

This was so different, and he was frozen, completely unsure what he should do.

He took a step towards Harry and the other two boys who were fussing over him as they got him to his feet. “He alright?” His voice managed to say, and he thought he sounded steady.

Niall nodded and one of their mics picked up Harry said, “I’m fine, just a little bruising on my pride.”

Louis couldn’t even laugh as he took another step towards them. “He got any bumps?” He could hear the crowd reacting to his words but he was too focused on trying to toe the stupid line. _Just one more show,_ he kept thinking.

“He seems good,” Liam said, his hand on Harry’s lower back.

Louis stopped in the middle of the stage, only a couple yards away from them.

“I’m fine, Lou,” Harry said. He didn’t say it into a mic, but either Liam or Niall’s mic picked it up so it carried easily across the stadium.

Louis tried to smile in response but it was hard to do when he was still worried. He caught Harry’s eyes and dropped his hand from his mouth so he could sign “doctor”. He could see the way Harry visibly sighed, but he nodded in agreement as Liam and Niall left his side to try and continue the show.

“Sorry about that,” Liam was saying to the audience. “It’s all squared away now though. Harry is okay! So I think we’ll take it from the top, yeah?”

The audience screamed, but Louis didn’t look at them. He was too busy watching Harry and making sure he wasn’t trying to hide any pain. He somehow managed to get through the song and then he was following Harry backstage without explanation. He knew Niall and Liam could cover for them for a minute, maybe even two.

The local EMT they had at the stadium in case of emergencies was waiting already to check on Harry. She’d already been briefed about Harry’s pregnancy so she knew what other complications there could be.

It only took her a moment to give her verdict. “You’re fine.”

Louis’ chest untightened just a bit. “Are you sure? You don’t need to like, have an ultrasound or something?”

The woman gave him a patient smile. “A mother’s body is pretty strong. Any fall that would hurt the baby would have to seriously hurt the mother first. And your friend here has no serious injuries.”

Louis didn’t snap at her that Harry wasn’t _just_ his friend, a fact that he should earn brownie points for. Harry smiled at her as he stepped back towards Louis, a hand on his lower tummy protectively. “Thanks a lot. I’ll try and be more careful.”

Louis wasn’t sure who he was telling. He let his hand wander on top of Harry’s own. He’d feel better if he could feel the baby move but Harry had only started feeling flutterings the other day. “Are you okay?” He asked instead, even as he saw the assistant stage manager impatiently tapping his foot beside them.

Harry nodded and leaned down for a quick kiss. “All good, pinky promise.”

Louis squeezed the top of Harry’s hand gently before dropping it from the stomach. “Fucking freaked me out.”

“Freaked myself out too. Only stayed on the ground for so long because I was making sure everything felt alright. And it did.”

The assistant stage manager had apparently seen enough because he clapped Louis on the shoulder. “Alright, get back out there. You’ve still got half a show to go.”

Louis glared at him. He knew he was just doing his job but Louis would have appreciated it if he let them breathe a little. Harry stepped back on stage to a loud roar from the audience and Louis heard him announce that he had just been checked over and he was fine. Louis gave the assistant stage manager one last glare before he too joined the boys.

He paid extra attention to Harry the rest of the show, just to be sure he wasn’t going to hurt himself again.

***

They’d come out Tuesday and Wednesday they had a show.

It wasn’t ideal; Michelle had bemoaned the lack of absorption time the public and fans had between coming out and this first completely uncontrolled public appearance, but there wasn’t anything more they could do about it. They hadn’t announced it during the break after the EU tour because management wanted to show that the boys could still deliver on American soil before the news broke. And if they waited any later they would be dropping the news on a concert day with zero time for anyone to react.

The pre-taped interview with James had aired last night, and the interview they’d filmed with Ellen had been part of her show that morning. Both interviews had been pretty bland, repeating in their own words what the print article in People’s cover story had already said: they were together, they were coming out now because it seemed like the right time, they were very happy to be sharing this with their fans who had always been very supportive, and they were looking forward to the impact they would be able to have on the community through charity work.

It was picture perfect, wrapped up in a nice shiny package and topped with kiddie friendly instagram seflies they had been more than happy to post.

But now, not even twenty four hours after the news had dropped, they were going to perform before 70,000 people with only a small sense of what the reaction would be. Louis had been monitoring the public reaction since last night. He knew he was technically supposed to be on a social media ban but he would go crazy if he had to wait for the twice daily update Michelle sent them that rounded up news articles and fan discourse.

“Ellen Page tweeted both of us,” Harry said from where he was resting his head in Louis’ lap.

“You’re not supposed to be looking at twitter,” Louis said as he scrolled through his mentions.

They were a mix of congratulations, spam, people begging for follows or DMs, and hate comments. Even when everything had changed nothing really changed.

“Neither are you.” Louis could see that Harry was still in the twitter app, searching up different celebrities. “John Barrowman invited us to lunch.”

“He acts like we’ve never gone to lunch before.”

“I’m telling him I’d rather have a doggy play date.”

Louis knew there was a seventy-five percent chance the tweet would never be approved but Harry didn’t seem to care as he kept replying to various people and filling up the queue their social media manager would have to scroll through. He didn’t bother pointing out that if Harry mentioned the baby - as he was doing in response to a comment that was rudely asking why they were coming out now - the tweet would definitely never be approved. Responding to messages, even if they wouldn’t get published, was one of Harry’s way to cope with being muzzled.

“Emma Watson said she’s proud of us,” he said instead, turn his phone down so Harry could see.

A wide smile bloomed across his face. “Tell her thank you.”

“Already did, love.”

Louis’ phone buzzed, and while he wanted to ignore it like he had the hundreds of other text messages he had gotten in the past day this one was from Andrea, their social media manager.

_u 2 are on a media ban_

She used shorthand whenever she was multitasking, which was all the time. 

_We aren’t on our computers._

She responded with a quickness. _tell h to stop i have thank you tweets ready to publish after your show responding individually is too messy and hurts feelings_

Louis looked down at Harry. He was texting someone now, but the person wasn’t saved in his phone so Louis had no idea who he could be talking to. Not that it really mattered. So many people had suddenly gotten ahold of their private numbers that Louis wasn’t sure who he was talking to half the time anymore.

_We’re just making sure you have work to do :)_

_i have other clients u no_

Louis really didn’t care, and he put her number on Do Not Disturb so he’d stop getting alerts from her.

“Sir Ian McKellen posted that picture we took with him at Graham Norton,” Louis said. He’d seen it last night but he wasn’t sure Harry had.

“Oh lemme see.” Harry put down his phone for a second to look at the picture Sir Ian had tweeted. “I look like I’m about two seconds from crying.”

“If I remember you did cry. Tears of joy.”

“I was meeting Gandalf _and_ Magneto. I can be forgiven. Oh Zachary Quinto said we made a cute couple.” Louis snorted. “Here, take a picture with me so I can use it in our response.”

Harry’s phone was shoved in his face, but Louis happily got into position and kissed Harry’s cheek as he heard the phone go off a few times. He turned his head a little to press another kiss to Harry’s lips. “You’re gonna ask for a picture in return, right?”

“Like, totally, duh,” Harry said, voice going full valley girl for a moment.

Louis laughed. “You should speak in only that accent tonight. Really camp it up.”

“Alright.”

Louis didn’t believe he would until they were onstage and Harry started his first solo speech. Which he delivered in his high pitched valley accent as he skipped down the catwalk.

The screams from the crowd seemed louder to Louis, and they reached a roar every time he or Harry started to speak. He couldn’t tell up on stage if the screaming was good or bad but every time he caught a fan’s face in the crowd they seemed to be happy. And the signs…

The signs were all positive.

Sure he was pretty sure security was told to confiscate anything offensive tonight, but the crowd he could see from stage was a sea of rainbows, positivity, and support. It empowered him, and so when he had his solo talk right before they started Diana he made sure to speak as candidly as he was allowed to.

And maybe he pushed the envelope just a bit.

“I just wanna take a moment before the next song to thank every one of you from the bottom of my heart. I know we’ve been thanking you this whole time, and we’re gonna keep thanking you because we love you, but this. This is a special thanks. This is a thanks from me and Haz, as well as Niall and Liam, for your continued support. Through everything. We’ve constantly been blown away by how much you guys love us, and I just want you to know it doesn’t go unnoticed. So thank you for these past five years.”

Movement caught his attention in the corner of his eye and he saw Lottie standing at the side of the catwalk. Right in front of her, on stage and within reach of him, was a crumbled up rainbow lump. Louis swallowed, a familiar longing gripping his stomach, and then he grinned.

“Remember, love wins, always,” he said before he reached down and grabbed the flag.

He could see it waving behind him on the big screen as he bolted up the catwalk and tossed it in Harry’s delighted face.

All 70,000 people in the audience screamed in support.


	5. august

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry!!! To make up for it this chapter is longer-ish :) Also you may notice I've renamed the chapters. I realized I should have started like this but I haven't been thinking straight for many years now.
> 
> Unbeta'd, any mistakes are mine. Enjoy!

They handled the public baby announcement differently than their coming out. This they were allowed - no strongly encouraged - to do through social media, which didn't bother Harry at all. They'd finally finished telling all of their friends the first week of August so it no longer mattered to Harry how anyone else found out. He was even willing to do a pap walk into a baby store on 5th avenue in New York with his bump on display, so really a post on social media was nothing.

The only thing was that if he had to announce it on twitter or instagram he wanted to do it his way.

"No. Absolutely not," Michelle said.

"Why not?"

"Your announcement is meant to be personal, but professional. The picture should reflect that."

"Why?" This time it was Louis who asked, arms crossed over his chest. "I think it's a brilliant idea."

Harry had to stop his snort because when he had mentioned the idea to Louis earlier today Louis had definitely laughed and told him, "no way, that's ridiculous." But when they were faced with anyone else they were always a united front. They'd learned to be that way over the past five years, and it was how they'd gotten to where they were now.

"This is your introduction to the general public as parents. While a joke may go over well for some fans and your family, it can be very isolating. Comedy is not universal. And you want as little backlash as possible."

Louis rolled his eyes. "People are gonna find ways to bitch anyway. Let Harry have this and I'll make my announcement completely professional and heartfelt, with a black and white photo et cetera, et cetera."

"No. This is not up for negotiation. Now we have some mock up posts you can make."

"We can write our own post," Harry cut in, trying to tap down his irritation. Michelle was just trying to do her job and help keep their image favorable. He smiled at Louis, and if there was a bite to it he wasn't to blame. "I'm sure my mum or Gemma will be happy to post it. _That's_ fine, isn't it?"

Michelle gave him a look that said she knew he was trying to be snarky and she didn't care. "Your family is free to post about this as they please - within reason of course. And after this initial post you'll be much less restricted in the tone you will have regarding your pregnancy. And if you have a second child you'll be allowed to be a bit more creative."

Harry bit his lip to stop himself from saying anything in response to that. He could see Louis smiling sharply in lieu of doing the same.

It wasn't until they were in the car with Louis driving that he let himself say what he was thinking.

"It's fucking shit, Haz, and completely laughable that she would even say that. 'If you have a second you'll be allowed to be more creative'. No fucking shit cause we won't be working with you!" He growled. "I like Michelle, don't get me wrong, and she's fucking good at her job but we are _not_ staying with them when we switch. I want that clear. We are moving publicists. We're moving management, labels, fucking stylists if we have to. Clean fucking sheet."

Harry understood where the frustration was coming from. They'd released the music video for their next single early last week, right before this mid-tour break. It had been a little rushed and they were still fighting the label about when the album would be released. November was impossible if they wanted Harry to participate in any promotions, and Louis had been in meetings since June arguing the pros and cons of each month's release. They were lucky that Liam and Niall were on their side about which month they wanted. At least someone was there to back them up in regard to the Sprog coming first.

"I swear to fucking god we do everything they ask, but they give us no leniency. We filmed their fucking music video. We've pushed back appointments for them, and they're fucking lucky your pregnancy has been free of any complications because it's bordering on negligence making you skip those. We're going ahead with this fucking album even though there is no reason we should. You're not going to be able to promote it regardless of when we release it, because we're either going to be on tour or we'll be busy with the Sprog. And yet we are still writing them a good album. It’s not like we gave them the ‘Cocksucker Blues’ either. We wrote good fucking songs.”

“I’m pretty sure our contract doesn’t allow us to write a whole album full of ‘Cocksucker Blues’. I think after the Stones pulled that stunt most record labels changed their wording that the album we produce needs to be of decent-ish quality.”

“Harold, I’m trying to go on a rant. Can you just indulge me for five minutes?”

“Lewis, I let you rant. But we’re going home. My mum and Gemma are waiting for us. We’re having a nice dinner and telling the world we’re welcoming the Sprog into our life soon. No more shop talk for the night, alright?”

Louis groaned but at this point it was mostly theatrics. He'd burned himself out, which wasn't a surprise for Harry considering. “Fine. But only because I love you.”

Harry smiled. “If you love so much can we stop at Five Guys on the way home? I _really_ need their fries.”

“Their fries? Really?”

Harry nodded, trying to make his face as serious looking as possible. “Just be thankful this craving is not for In and Out burgers. Or Chicago deep dish… though actually that _also_ sounds really good.”

“I’ll make sure we get some pizza when we get back to the States, alright?”

“You’re the best.” Harry leaned over and kissed Louis’ cheek.

“Bet you’d say that to anyone who got you a cheeseburger and fries,” Louis said, but he was smiling when Harry pulled away to settle back into his seat.

They lapsed into easy silence as Louis took the long way home so they could drive by a Five Guys. It took him a few minutes to find street parking, but once he did he pulled out his phone so he could take Harry’s order. It was a day off so Harry was wearing a tighter shirt that definitely showed he was pregnant, and it wouldn’t do to be spotted right before they dropped the news. 

“I want two bacon cheeseburgers with lettuce, jalapenos, relish, BBQ sauce, an order of regular fries and cajun fries, and a milkshake with coffee, oreo, salted caramel and banana.”

“Can’t do the coffee for you, love, you know that. But I’ll get you the other things, alright.” Louis leaned over and gave Harry a quick kiss on his pouted lips. “And I’ll stop by and get you some more coffee flavored candies on the way home.”

Harry sighed in defeat. "We need ice too."

"Why do we need ice? Oh. For your joke." Louis shook his head as he climbed out of the car, phone dutifully in hand.

Harry couldn't stop himself from pouting a little once he was alone. He just wanted coffee, it was the only consistent thing he craved, but he’d already had the one cup he was allowed every day with his breakfast so he’d have to suffer. He was just glad the line outside the Five Guys wasn’t insane today. He fucked around on his phone as he waited for Louis to come back with the food, shifting in his seat every few minutes. It was good they wouldn’t have to travel far after leaving here because he sensed a trip to the toilet coming up very soon.

There wasn’t much Harry didn’t enjoy about being pregnant so far. Sure he felt like he had a quicker temper now and then, and watching some of his favorite movies made him cry instead of just being completely enamored, but that wasn’t that bad. But the constant need to pee. That was annoying, and had been a serious issue so far during the tour, especially during a show. You don’t think ninety minutes is very long until you have to take four pee breaks in that duration because your blood vessels have opened up, or whatever.

Harry was very adamantly _not_ thinking about having to go to the toilet when the car unlocked and the driver door opened. Louis climbed in, a tray of milkshakes in one hand, the keys in his mouth, and three bags in his other hand.

Harry gave him a strained smile, mind still on his bladder. Wasn’t there something about not thinking about it making it easier? “That’s a lot of food.”

“Yeah, I’m a nice brother-in-law and asked Gemma if she wanted anything. Your mum too.” Louis fumbled around for a moment trying to figure out what to do with his hands and Harry reached over and grabbed the milkshakes, taking a sip out of the one that already had a straw in it.

Yup, that was his. It hit the spot, and he sighed, mind blissfully blank of bladder thoughts as he enjoyed the salted caramel banana flavor. “You’re perfect.”

“I know.” Louis got himself settled and pulled them out of their parking spot. “So the good news is when the fans I ran into post later that I bought an insane amount of food the tabloids won’t be able to make a go about me being fat because they’ll be too busy running stories about how you’re a tyrant who makes me do runs into fast food places to satisfy your cravings.”

“Just be happy I’m not dipping these cajun fries into the milkshake.” Harry took another large sip of his milkshake.

“That’s not weird. I do that all the time. You’re cravings aren’t that weird.”

Harry gave him a look as he let go of the straw with a loud pop. “You walked in on me eating mayonnaise out of the jar just last night.”

“No I didn’t. You were eating vanilla pudding in a mayo jar,” Louis said stubbornly. “I’ve done the trick meself, and remember that time I put water in a vodka bottle and drank it all in one go to fuck with Liam? I know your tricks.”

Harry had not in fact been eating vanilla pudding, but Louis refused to believe him. “What’s the bad news?”

“The bad news?” Louis asked.

“You said the good news was about the tabloids, what’s the bad news?”

“Oh! The bad news is cause I ran into them I couldn’t pop into the shop next door and grab you your candies cause I was worried they were gonna try and find you.”

Harry shrugged as he grabbed a bag and checked its contents. “Just gonna have to stop by one on our way home.” He took a handful of cajun fries and tossed them in his mouth before taking another sip of his milkshake. Not as obvious as dipping them in the shake, but just as effective.

“I’ll run out after I drop you off at home.”

“I really have to wee.”

Louis gave him a look. “Or I could pull over into a petrol station cause it sounds like you can’t wait the fifteen minutes it will take to get home.”

“I really can’t.”

“Didn’t you just go before we had the meeting with Michelle?”

“Yes, I did. And now I need to go again.” This was not the first time they had had this kind of conversation, but Louis always seemed confused when Harry mentioned it.

He did pull into a petrol station though, and Harry stumbled out, empty milkshake cup in hand. He’d stopped feeling guilty about how quickly he ate his food now early on, and it was probably for the best. He still did some light exercise, which was one of the things that kept some of the pain he had been expecting at bay. 

When he returned to the car he saw Louis had put the bag of coffee candies in his seat and he let out a delighted sound.

“Yeah, yeah, I know I’m amazing. Get in, your ice is melting in the back seat.”

Harry grinned, ripping open the bag as he got into his seat and he popped one of the candies in his mouth. The coffee flavor exploded in his mouth as he bit down into the chewy center and he let out a moan. “I’m in heaven.”

“Well, I got you a second milkshake, and figured with the chewy candy you could mix it in to get your coffee, banana, whatever flavor madness.”

Harry stared at Louis in awe. “I love you.” He felt tears prickling the corner of his eyes all of a sudden so his smile was watery when Louis glanced over at him a moment later.

“Aw, love, don’t cry.”

“But you got me soft candies to mix in with my milkshake,” Harry said, trying to inject as much joking into it as he could, even though he was completely serious.

“Well, I also got you the hard ones you can suck on. They’re in the back.”

Now Harry really felt like he was going to cry. He stopped himself by taking out his burger and putting fries inside the bun so he could eat them mixed together.

***

The house was controlled chaos. That was the only word to describe it. There were folded up boxes sitting in their front room that used to package the baby furniture they’d bought. The house still smelled like fresh paint from the new coat they had done in the nursery over the weekend. The color they had originally picked was too dark once it was up in the room and the various Skype calls with their interior designer, Nicole, hadn’t picked that up well.

Actually they’d realized they hated a lot of things Nicole had done over the past month once they saw them in person. Harry wondered not for the first time if he was too picky. Did it really matter if the Sprog’s crib was a dark wood or a light wood? Or that the Sprog’s room didn’t get exactly the right kind of light if the room was [“blue stream”](https://40.media.tumblr.com/f3b9718b40f41d663ae3bd587706d10c/tumblr_nv9r0ygpfq1u882jpo1_75sq.jpg) instead of [”sea of tranquility](https://41.media.tumblr.com/5ac37e42b20324a969073006b7f32f24/tumblr_nv9r0ygpfq1u882jpo2_75sq.jpg)? What they were doing was only going to account for two, maybe three years of the Sprog’s life.

Both his mum and Jay assured him he wasn’t being ridiculous, and Louis agreed with most of the changes he wanted. It just meant that they had a lot more to do over this break than they had originally intended, but that was why they had gotten such an early start on redoing the house.

At least the living room had turned out nice after it had been upgraded to baby friendly. The plush leather couches they had originally had were moved to one of their other houses, and in their wake were two brightly colored replacements that were much more suited for inevitable spit ups, spilled food, and trampoline uses. They’d replaced the coffee table they’d had since they first moved in together with one with rounded edges. The original coffee table had been nice, sturdy, and the perfect height for a newly walking toddler to bang their head against.

There weren’t many other rooms that needed to be redone past basic baby proofing, so that left the big projects as the Sprog’s room, and the downstairs room that would turned into a playroom. The downstairs could wait a year or two. The bedroom could not.

Harry was just glad they had started so early instead of waiting until September like they had been originally thinking. He couldn’t imagine trying to start these projects right now. The thought alone raised his stress levels dangerously.

“We’re home!” Harry called as they walked through the front door. Louis trailed behind him carrying the food and ice. He didn’t hear the dogs bark which probably meant either Gemma or his mum had let them outside.

“Kitchen!” That was Gemma.

She was sitting at the kitchen table, a tall glass of water in front of her, when they both entered the kitchen.

“Cozy?” Louis asked, skirting around Harry to put the two bags of ice in the sink.

“As a peach, what’s with the ice?”

Louis ignored Gemma’s question. “Think it’ll be alright in the sink, Haz? Not gonna melt?”

“It’s ice, melting is what it does, but we can take the picture soon.” Harry answered him before smiling at Gemma. “Louis got you food.”

Gemma’s eyes lit up and she made grabby hands. “My sacrifice has arrived.”

Harry laughed as he took the bag of food from Louis handed it Gemma, along with her milkshake. “Where’s mum?”

“Out back with your pups. Lassie was being a little shit.”

“His name is Cody,” Louis corrected her.

Cody was their newest dog, a seven month old collie with way too much energy. He’d been living with Harry’s mum while they were on tour and Harry felt a little neglectful, just like he always did when it came to leaving their dogs behind.

“Cody, Lassie, Shithead is what he is. He was zooming up and down the stairs and bothering me while I was putting the crib together. He tried to chew on a leg and I almost had a heart attack.”

“Aw, little guy probably just wanted your attention,” Louis said right as Harry asked, “you got the crib together then?”

Gemma nodded. “Yes I did. I am woman, hear me roar. Oh, and Martin did stop by for a couple hours while you were out. Got the whole thing sketched out.”

Harry felt his face light up. Martin was an artist they had commissioned to paint a mural in the Sprog’s room. They’d decided on that option over wallpaper because that way they could get exactly what they wanted. He hadn’t been able to start until now because of the wrong base color being chosen, so Harry was excited to see the work he had gotten done. “Oh can we go see?”

“Wait just a minute,” Gemma said, holding up a finger. “I need to ask the most important question.” Harry sighed, but indulged her as he came around to stand in front of her so she was eye level with his bump. She grinned. “How’s my favorite little nibling*?”

“The Sprog is active.”

Gemma cooed. “Awww, are they excited to make their debut today?” She glanced up and gave Harry a shit-eating grin. “And are mummy and daddy ready for this?”

“Yes we fucking are,” Louis said. “Hence the ice. And Gemma, love, we’ve talked about this. You can’t go picking favorites already. This is only the first kid. What are you gonna do when they have siblings, and you’ve already got a favorite?”

She glanced around Harry to address Louis. “See I’ve figured this all out, right. First you give me a niece and a nephew so I can say one is my favorite niece and one is my favorite nephew. And then, since I know you won’t stop at two, you just need to make sure they all have different features. So it’ll be my favorite blue-eyed niece, my favorite green-eyed nephew, my precious ginger nephew.”

“Are you aware how genetics work, Gem?” Louis wondered out loud. “Cause I have no clue how Harry and I’ll make a ginger kid.”

“I see the red in your scruff. You are capable of ginger kids, Louis. You just have to believe!”

“Babe if you have a ginger, I’m having a word with Ed.”

Harry laughed. “So am I. Now can we go see what he’s done?”

Gemma rolled her eyes and unwrapped her burger. “Can I eat my food? Mum’s still outside, she’s gonna wanna see too. And I guess you should do whatever you wanted to with that ice before it melts. And explain that to me.”

Harry resisted the urge to stomp his foot. “The higher ups won’t let me use a picture of Louis holding two bags of ice while I point to my stomach to announce the pregnancy so either you or mum have to do it.”

“Ice Ice Baby, that’s really what you came up with?” Gemma asked, looking over at Louis. “I hope you’re aware that I’m not taking him back. He’s yours, bad puns and all. No refund.”

“Don’t I fucking know it,” Louis said as he grabbed the bags of ice out of the sink. They were dripping onto the floor and Harry frowned. Louis caught his frown and followed his gaze. “I’ll clean it up. Gemma, can you take the pic?”

“Ugh, fine. But only because I love you. Mum is gonna be the one to post it though.” She put down her burger and took out her phone while Harry shuffled himself into position.

Louis didn’t need any direction as he pulled a funny face while holding up both bags of ice. Harry copied his expression as he pointed to his belly with both index fingers. They probably looked ridiculous, standing in their kitchen, dressed in sweats and t-shirts, pulling funny faces. It was a perfect representation of them.

“There, happy? Can I eat my burger in peace?” Gemma asked as she handed over her phone to Harry.

The picture was exactly what he had wanted. Louis rolled his eyes when he saw it after putting the ice back in the sink and wiping up floor, but Harry could see how fond he looked. “You’re the best,” he said to Louis. “Thank you.”

“Oh you thank him but not your wonderful sister who took time out of her day to take that ridiculous picture. I see how it is.”

Harry laughed. “Thank you, Gemma. We couldn’t do it without you. Now can you finish up your food so I can see all the work you’ve done?”

Gemma flipped him off.

***

His mum came back in while Gemma was finishing up her milkshake. With her came the three dogs, who immediately ran for Louis. He was more than happy to get down to his knees and pet all three of them, though Cody was the one who ended up in his arms. He was almost too big for it to be comfortable to hold but Louis didn’t mind as he let Cody lick his face. Their other two dogs, Fiona and Wazza, were older, and therefore a bit calmer. They easily went to lie down on their beds when they noticed the destination was upstairs, but Cody stayed happily in Louis’ arms.

“Alright, I’ll show you the bedroom first, and then you can be in awe at my amazing assembly skills,” Gemma said as they walked upstairs.

“Have you seen it yet, Anne?” Louis asked.

“No, I was outside playing with the dogs for most of the afternoon,” Anne said from beside Harry. “Didn’t want them bothering Gemma or Martin. And I got some exercise.”

Harry smiled as they came to a stop at the top of the stairs. He could see that someone had shut the door to the Sprog’s room so the inside would be a surprise. Gemma cleared her throat and made a big show of walking to the door to open it.

She stepped aside to let the three of them enter and see the work that had been done.

The mural expanded out from the far right corner of the room. It took over the majority of the right wall, with various cartoon fish sketched out. Even without color Harry could recognize Flounder, Dory, and Marlin. On the far wall the mural came to an end right in the middle of the two windows in the room. Martin had incorporated the first window into the mural, using it as a place for Sebastian the Crab and other characters to peek their heads around as they watched Crush and Squirt swim above them.

At the very end of the right wall near the ceiling Harry could see that Martin had in fact followed Louis’ request. There was the bottom of a boat and a rudder drawn out, with Tad, Sheldon, and Pearl watching as Nemo “touched the butt”. Louis thought it was a hilarious joke. The addition worked well though because it added to the overall image they had hoped to achieve, which was the illusion that you were underwater.

Harry looked up at the ceiling which had already been painted a foamy white and blue to look like waves.

“It’s amazing,” Louis breathed out.

“Yeah,” Harry managed to agree as he tried to imagine what it would look like once the furniture was set up. “Martin’s doing a hell of a job.”

“So you like? Cause I’d hate to have to paint over it.”

“It’s going to be beautiful,” his mum said, walked closer to the wall to get a better look at some of the lighter penciled in details.

Louis hummed and Harry watched as his face transformed to speculative. Even Cody wiggling in his arms didn’t break the look on his face. “Well, now that you mention it, maybe we should do a whole safari theme.” He winked at Harry. “What do you say?”

“Yeah, yeah, we can go full Lion King. Get some giraffes.”

Gemma rolled her eyes. “I hate you both. Come on, I’ll show you the furniture you got. I looked at how it went with the new paint color and I personally like it better than what you had before. So good call.” Gemma led them down the hallway to one of the guest bedrooms.

It had been turned into a holding cell for the Sprog’s furniture while the room was painted, so it was very crowded with the added dresser, crib, and changing table. The four of them, and Cody, managed to squeeze into the room though and Harry’s eyes immediately zeroed in on the crib.

They’d gone with a darker cherry oak instead of white this time and Harry immediately liked it for the set of furniture. He could see now how the subtle red would pop against the green and blues. Instead of a simple rectangle crib they had gotten a sleigh crib. The rounded edges on the sides softened the whole frame, and Harry thought it would fit in well as almost a makeshift ship.

Louis had put Cody on the floor so he could go up and touch first the crib, and then the dresser and changing table. He pulled open the drawers, checking the depth to see how much it could hold. Harry was rooted in his spot.

It was finally hitting him. They were having a baby. It was weird to be having this moment now, after he was almost twenty-five weeks pregnant but some things you didn’t have control over. They were having a baby and it was going to be a part of their life. The Sprog would soon be sleeping in the room right next to them, in that crib, and there would be so many accidents on that changing table.

“Wow,” he said. Because that was all he could say.

“Well I love it,” Louis said, voice much louder than Harry. “Do you agree, Haz?”

Harry just nodded dumbly because he was still a little speechless. His mum wrapped an arm around his shoulders and squeezed. “You make good calls, my little boy.”

Harry couldn’t stop the grin that spread across his face at that nickname. “Thanks.”

“Why are you congratulating him. I’m the one who put that crib together,” Gemma said, pointing to the toolbox sitting next to it.

Louis rolled his eyes as he edged Cody away from the furniture and back towards the door. “You just put on the railings. It’s not like you built it from scratch.”

“Do I see you holding a screwdriver? No. So don’t try and guess how much blood, sweat, and tears went into putting on those railings. Right, Harry?”

Harry’s eyes darted from Gemma to Louis. He was completely unsure how he had gotten dragged into this. He blinked, shifted his feet, and... “I have to go wee.”

His mum laughed the loudest, and it carried on behind him as he trudged down the hall to the loo.

***

Harry was sitting alone, naked except for pants, in his dressing room trying to write a song. He’d asked Louis if he could step outside for a half hour or so because he couldn’t concentrate with him in the background. It was a new thing brought on mostly by his heightened emotions making him more irritable. Louis rolled with it, understanding that it wasn’t anything personal. Backstage there were loads of ways to entertain himself, and tons of people who were usually willing to indulge him.

Harry paused in his writing so he could stretch. He was starting to cramp more often, and the baby weight was beginning to get a little unbearable at times. It was changing a lot of things he hadn’t considered just yet. For one, he was sat at a desk in a chair specifically made to promote good posture. Usually he wrote curled up on himself on the sofa because that was the most comfortable position for him. But now he couldn’t manage to pull his knees to his chest, let alone get a proper curling up going.

When he was finished with his stretch he wiggled a bit in his seat, his left hand dropping down over the bump to pet over it. He could feel the Sprog was up and he always liked to take a few minutes and try to feel what all they were getting up to, moving around in his belly. He had a pretty good idea at this point when the Sprog was awake or asleep, and Louis loved to hear about it even if he couldn’t feel just yet.

Dr. Smith had informed them that it was normal for male carriers not to feel any movement from outside the stomach until almost week twenty-eight since the baby was usually behind the placenta because of how slightly further back the uterus was. He had assured them that as the movements got more pronounced, and the Sprog grew, they would be able to feel movement from outside Harry’s body.

Harry dropped his hand and tried to regain the previous position he was sitting in. It had been relatively comfortable, with his thighs supporting any weight from the bump. He could feel the Sprog move and there was a swift twinge that made him huff as he rubbed over the spot.

His hand felt something push against it.

Harry stopped what he was doing and stared at his belly, dropping his right hand to the other side so he could verify if what he thought happened had indeed happened. He held his breath, not wanting to get too excited just yet.

Something pushed against his hand again.

A giant smile graced his face.

He needed to get Louis.

Harry tried to get out of his seat as quickly as possible, but he ended up rolling the chair he was in across the dressing room because it was faster. He didn’t even care he was almost naked, bystanders could deal with it.

“Louis!” He screamed as he flung open the door, looking up the hallway. “Louis!” He looked the other way and his eyes fell on Louis.

He was sitting right outside the dressing room with Lux in his lap helping her play hand games with Lottie. He was staring at Harry with wide eyes filled with worry. “What’s the matter?”

“Come in here right now,” Harry said, trying to push himself back so he wasn’t blocking the door. He still had a hand on his belly. He hoped the excitement he was feeling didn’t scare the Sprog into stage fright.

“What’s wrong?” Louis asked. He sounded really worried as he handed Lux off to Lottie before he stood up.

“Nothing, just come in here. Shut the door.”

“What the hell, Haz,” Louis said. Harry waited until the door was shut before he grabbed Louis’ wrist and pressed his hand over his bare stomach. “The fu-”

“Shush,” Harry hissed as he kept Louis’ hand flat against his stomach. He could still feeling the Sprog moving around inside him so he knew it was only a matter of time before-

Twinge.

He glanced up at Louis. Louis was staring at his hand.

“Was that…?” He whispered.

Harry nodded excitedly as Louis brought his other hand down to his belly. “You feel that?”

He felt a second twinge and watched as Louis’ face softened. “Yeah. Yeah I do.” Louis sunk down to his knees so he was level with Harry’s stomach. “Hey Sprog. It’s daddy. Are you kicking up a storm in there?” There was no twinge in response but that didn’t stop Louis. “I bet this is just the start of you really pissing off your mum. But don’t worry, I’m gonna appreciate every little kick you give me, okay?”

Twinge.

Louis dropped a kiss on his stomach. “I love you so, so much. And I can’t wait to meet you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *nibling is a gender neutral word for niece or nephew. It is an actual English word but it's super uncommon.
> 
> The first part of this chapter brought to you by [this buzzfeed video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fdGlItO8lkI&feature=youtu.be) (stick around until the very end of the video to hear the joke Harry will inevitably tell about their future kids)
> 
> The [Cocksucker Blues](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schoolboy_Blues) is a "real" song (though apparently it has a different title?? i always knew it as this one) by the Stones. I was told the story by my father many years ago and I'm sure this is exactly the kind of thing he wanted me to use that knowledge for. I will be super upset if Harry has not at least considered setting the ringtone for 1DHQ on his phone to this song.


	6. early september

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> :D
> 
> The first part of the chapter is the most drama you're gonna get in this fic, just an FYI.
> 
> Still not beta'd so all mistakes are mine.

In the end the final straw for Louis was when Harry fell for the third time, at the show in Buffalo. So when it came time for them to get ready for the Montreal show Louis made sure a member of the crew had a wheelchair ready for Harry to use before they went on stage. The only hitch in this plan came when he realized that Harry wasn’t on board with this at all.

“I don’t need a wheelchair. I’m pregnant, not fucking invalid.” 

Harry was upset. 

Louis might even go with angry, because they rarely fought, and it was never, ever in front of people. Which was not the case now. No, at this moment Harry was starting the fight in front of everyone.

The rest of the crew was scrambling backstage, preparing for them to come out and start the show. Niall was acting incredibly focused on tuning his guitar, and Liam seemed to think his in-ear needed special attention. It was all incredibly awkward, but Louis wasn’t going to back down.

“I’m not fucking doing it-” Harry was saying and Louis snapped.

“Yes, you fucking are. Three times. Three _fucking_ times I have watched you fall on stage. And each time I nearly die with worry for you and the Sprog.”

“You fall _all the time._ You think that doesn’t worry me-”

“I’m not seven months pregnant! I’m not carrying _life_ inside me!”

“Don’t say that like I don’t know what’s going on in my own body.”

“Then you should know the importance of not falling and hurting yourself _or_ our child. You’re being unreasonable.”

“Unreasonable?!” Harry’s voice cracked a little as it raised to a shout. “I'm unreasonable because I’m confident enough in how my body feels that I don’t think I need some minder pushing me along on stage? I’m being careful, Louis. Don’t act like I’m not.”

“I know you’re being careful, that’s what you told me after you first fell. And what you said after you fell and twisted your ankle the _second_ time. _Careful_ , but the truth is you are carrying extra weight in a way you never before and you can’t fucking run, or skip the way you want to because you aren’t used to the differences and it’s _dangerous_.”

By the end of his speech - and he thought it was a good one. Well thought out and understandable - Harry was just staring at him wide eyed and lower lip trembling before he bit out, “fuck you,” and stormed off.

Louis stared at his retreating back for a second before he cursed and jogged after him. He heard Tim, the stage director, call out, “ten minutes!” but he didn’t care. All he knew was he’d upset Harry somehow and he needed to fix it.

“Haz! Harry! Come on,” he caught up to Harry easily and spun him toward him as gently as possible.

Harry was in tears, and when he looked at Louis all he did was sniffed and said, “if you say one thing about hormones, I swear-”

Louis’ stomach dropped and he wrapped Harry up in his arms as much as he could with the belly in the way. “Oh Haz, I’m so sorry. I’m just trying to help, but I’ve gone and upset you.”

Harry hiccuped as he tried to hold back a sob and Louis had to bite his lip to stop the words “this isn’t good for the baby” from tumbling out. He was positive Harry was well aware of that, and he was also positive Harry did actually realize why Louis wanted him to use the wheelchair.

He needed to take a different approach because he knew they both wanted the same thing in the end. “Love? Talk to me. Why are you so opposed to the wheelchair?”

Harry sniffed. “I don’t need it. I can walk just fine.”

Louis sighed, and rubbed Harry’s back. “I know love, and if you were just walking around on stage I’d be okay, but you get excited and pumped up and you start skipping and that’s my concern.” He looked Harry in the eyes, waiting to see if he wanted Louis to continue. Harry was still crying, but he nodded for Louis to go on. “You can still stand up. I’d just feel better - and I’m sure you would - if instead of running down the catwalk you used the wheelchair. It’ll be safer.”

“I don’t need someone to push me.”

Louis blinked. “Love, no one is going to do that. Except maybe me or Liam. Possibly Niall if he doesn’t have his guitar. Is that what you thought? That I’d make someone push you?” Harry nodded. “Oh love, no. You still have the upper body strength to wheel yourself. I’m so sorry I wasn’t clear about that. Are we on the same page again?”

Harry nodded again, reaching up to wipe his eyes. “I think so. God, I’m such a mess.”

“Hush,” Louis said. “It’s perfectly understandable. I was a dick, and should have told you instead of springing it on you right before we went on stage.”

“Five minutes!” Tim screamed.

Louis refrained from shouting back and just continued to rub Harry’s back. “Love you.”

“Love you too.”

“Ready for the show?”

“I probably should redo my makeup.”

“Alright,” Louis turned them back to where Liam, Niall, and the chair were waiting. Lottie was there, makeup bag in hand.

“I’m gonna do a quick touch up on you,” she said as Harry lowered himself into the wheelchair.

He gave the wheelchair a couple test rolls to see how much effort needed to be put into moving.

Louis watched for a moment before pulling out his phone. “Can I take a picture of you, Haz? I’ll post it on Instagram so the fans will know not to worry.” He knew it was only a few minutes before the show started but their tweets spread fast.

“Yeah, that’s alright,” Harry said, stopping his rolling so Louis could take a picture and Lottie could finish his makeup.

Louis captioned the picture with “new look for H !! Everything is o k just can’t have him getting to wild on stage ” and showed it to Harry before sending it through.

He couldn’t tell if the sudden roar was a result of every fan getting notified of his post simultaneously or the intro video starting. Either way it got him in the right head space for the start of the concert.

***

“Alright, are you ready?”

“Hit me.”

Harry smacked Louis lightly in the face with his notebook. They were sitting on the couch in their dressing room before the final show in the U.S.. Or at least Harry was sitting. Louis was sprawled out across the rest of the couch with his head rested on Harry’s belly. It was tricky to do, because Louis didn’t want to actually put too much weight on his stomach, but he liked the feeling of the Sprog kicking and moving. It was a very gentle pitter-patter against the back of his head.

“I can’t believe you actually hit me.”

Harry stuck his tongue out and Louis returned the gesture, making Harry laugh and put his tongue away. “Okay, but seriously we have maybe twenty minutes before we have to head into makeup. Can we do this?”

“It’s fine, Haz. I got me list right here.” Louis shook his phone so Harry could see that he did indeed have a list of names.

“Alright. So. I have Anastasia.”

“No.”

“Hey. We said we could read our lists without comment!”

The Sprog gave a pretty powerful kick right as Harry moved to adjust on the couch. “Ow,” Louis said mostly for show. He sat up and placed his hand on Harry’s stomach where the Sprog had just kicked. There was another bit of movement and Louis leaned down to kiss where he approximate the Sprog’s head would be. Harry grunted, and Louis looked up. “You alright?”

“Mrrgh, bladder. The Sprog got me again.” Harry winced as he tried to stand, and Louis had to help so he didn’t fall. “Don’t go anywhere. I’ll be right back.”

Louis collapsed back on the couch, scrolling through his list of names. He could feel Harry’s book digging into the side of his head, and it would be easy to flip to the page he had his names written on and see what they were but that felt a bit like cheating. They had decided that Harry would come up with a list for girls’ names and Louis would come up with a list for boys’ names. They would then go over the lists together and decide on a name together.

How hard could it be after all?

Harry waddled back into the room, and at this point it was basically a waddle, and the two of them managed to get Harry seated back on the couch. Harry grabbed his book and flipped back to the page he had marked. “Now where was I? Oh yes, Anastasia. Then I had Beatrice, Caroline, Deidre-”

“Okay, no, stop. Is this seriously your list? Please tell me it’s not.”

Harry looked down at him with a straight face and it was only because he knew Harry that Louis was able to see the slight twitch of his eye that signified he was holding back a smile.

“Harold. If those are the actual names you’ve come up with for the Sprog I won’t blame them for kicking your bladder. I might even encourage it.”

Harry finally grinned and flipped to the next page in his notebook. “Alright, fine. I only have a handful: Billie, Fred, Emma, Teresa, which I thought could be shortened to Terry, and finally Ava.”

Louis contemplated the names for a minute. They were about what he was expecting, except. “What about Darcy?”

Harry sighed. “I know, I really love that name, but I just keep thinking about Kat Denning’s breasts every time I hear it now ever since fucking Niall mentioned them, and that’s not something I can do to our daughter.”

Louis nodded. He’d thrown out a couple of names for similar reasons. He liked Michael a lot but all it conjured up was images of a large floppy dick and that wasn’t something he wanted associated with the Sprog.

“Fair enough. Here’s my list. We have Scott, Cameron, Stephen with an p-h, Victor, and Calum. I’m honestly on the fence with that one because I’d want it to be Calum, not _Cal_ but I won’t be able to control the other kids.”

Harry pursed his lips. “Not too bad. I don’t hate any of them.”

“Don’t love any of them either though, do we?”

Harry looked at his belly and Louis watched as he put his hand on the top of the swell. “What do you think, Sprog? You feeling any of these?” Louis smiled fondly and twisted around so he could kiss the top of Harry’s hand. “What do you think about Billie? Do we like Billie?”

He couldn’t feel the Sprog move in direct response to the question, but that was alright. He knew they couldn’t _actually_ understand what was being said, or even who was talking. “What about Cameron? Are you a little Cameron in there?”

Harry laughed and Louis guessed the Sprog was moving a little, though he couldn’t feel it. “What about Brighton?” Harry asked.

“Brighton? The fuck, Haz?”

He winked at Louis. “What? I just thought of it. Could be cute.”

Louis rolled his eyes. “Can you believe your mum, little Sprog? He thinks you’d like _Brighton_. What next, do you think? Bristol? Avon? Think he’s gonna move onto big cities next? Maybe you’re a London.”

Harry’s laugh this time was much louder, and Louis couldn’t help but preen. “Probably should go with Tokyo if we’re naming them after places.”

Louis frowned. “Why Tokyo?”

Harry arched his eyebrows as if waiting for the ball to drop in Louis’ mind, but for the life of him he couldn’t figure it out. Harry sighed. “There’s a good chance the Sprog was _made_ in Tokyo.”

“Oh,” Louis said, eyes widening before he burst into laughter. “Harold! We shouldn’t tell people that!”

“Why not?” He was grinning. “‘S why Beckham named his son Brooklyn.”

“Oh my god,” Louis muttered. “Your mum’s nutters. Are you sure you’re okay in there? Just another couple months before you’re proper cooked and you can escape.”

Harry laughed and shoved Louis’ shoulder. “You’re the nutter.”

Louis paid Harry no mind, addressing his stomach with one hand on it to feel if the Sprog was kicking. “What about Sydney? Quite like that name.”

The Sprog gave a sharp kick, much to Louis’ delight. He pulled away to loosely hold up his hands as if he were boxing. “Oh yeah? You wanna fight about it?” He mimed throwing a few punches, short, light little jabs that sent Harry into hysterics.

That’s how Lottie found them a few minutes later when she called for them to get their makeup done.


	7. late september

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this chapter is short D: but it's cute?
> 
> Not beta'd, all mistakes are mine.

Harry was taking pictures of cupcakes. He was trying to get the right angle to artfully show off the decal sticking out from the chocolate duck that asked, “Waddle it be?”

There actually wasn’t anything inside the cupcakes except a white cream cheese frosting filling, and each cupcake had a different color frosting to make it impossible to guess what sex the baby was going to be. That’s how Harry and Louis wanted it, but everyone seemed to suddenly have an opinion on what it would be and Harry was frankly sick of the question. So was it petty to post a black and white picture of a reveal cupcake? Probably. But at this point he didn’t care.

“Still trying to get the picture right?” Niall asked.

Harry didn’t look up from where he was turning the cupcake to try and get better light on it. “Yeah.”

Niall had come over early to help Harry before the baby shower since Louis had errands to run. Liam would have joined him but he had meetings all morning and would probably be late to the party. Niall had been a big help already: putting up last minute decoration, moving the furniture in the living room around to make room for everyone who was coming over, setting out plates, and putting up with Harry’s tetchiness.

“Why is everyone so obsessed with what sex the Sprog is going to be? I expected it from the media, but our friends?”

“They just don’t wanna end up getting the wrong thing for the baby,” Niall said.

Harry glared at Niall’s back until he turned around and then he made sure to smile sickeningly sweet. “Niall, why the fuck would any of our friends think that matters?” He pinched the hem of his pink maternity frock and shook it in Niall’s direction.

Niall, to his credit, shrugged, unaffected by Harry’s sarcasm. “I don’t know, mate, people are old fashioned. In fairness, I went the safe route and bought a ton of football onesies for the little one.”

Harry snorted. “You know Donny _and_ Man U have already donated baby clothes right?”

“Yeah but Derby didn’t. Had to buy that shit myself. And let’s see, got a Chelsea one-”

“I’m gonna kill you.”

Niall ignored him. “I thought about buying an Ireland one but I’ll only do that if we make the Euros.”

“You know England is already in the Euros.”

“I’m calling dibs. The kid will be my Euro watching buddy.”

“I believe that’s called kidnapping.”

“Do I have the face of a kidnapper?”

“Yes,” Harry said, finally getting a shot he felt he could use. He pulled up Instagram and put a black and white filter on the picture before adding the caption he wanted.

“Not sure having the two baby emojis sends the right message. People’ll think you’re having twins.”

“Ugh you’re right,” Harry said, deleting the emojis and replacing it with a simple “A Sprog”. He showed it to Niall before posting it.

“Anything else you need me to do?” Niall asked as he put his hand on Harry’s back to help him over to a chair. “Food to lay out?”

Harry shook his head, accepting the help with no complaints. His stomach hadn’t gotten much bigger but over the last couple of weeks his chest had started to swell making his posture even worse than it normally was. The change was exciting; the accompanying pain was not, but at least he’d learned to take the help when it was offered.

“No, everything else should be set. People’ll probably start showing up within the hour.”

“Louis on his way back?” Niall asked.

Harry patted around for his phone but the frock he was wearing didn’t have any pockets and a quick glance informed him he’d left the phone right by the cupcakes. Harry’s head rolled back and he groaned. “I think he texted me.”

Niall followed his eyes and when they landed on his phone he got up. “I got you.”

Cody’s head perked up when Niall stood up. Fiona and Wazza quickly followed him and before Harry heard anything else all three dogs were running for the front door. It wasn’t until a moment later that Harry heard the front door open and Louis call out, “I’m home!”

“H is on the couch,” Niall called back as he returned to Harry’s side with his phone.

Louis rounded the corner into the kitchen with all three dogs at his heels and snagged a chocolate duck off of a cupcake as he passed by them.

“Oi, you can’t have those yet,” Harry said, frowning.

Louis bit the duck’s head off. “I’m taste testing. Very important role.” He came over and gave Harry a kiss before he turned his attention to the dogs, petting all three of them with one hand while he held the headless chocolate duck away from them.

Harry grabbed it from him and popped it in his mouth. He moaned at the taste and once he’d swallowed he waved at Niall. “Give me that cupcake.” Niall laughed but did as he was asked. Harry ignored the judging look Louis was shooting him and enjoyed the cupcake once Niall handed it to him.

“Is it delicious?” Louis asked.

“Yusm,” Harry said with a mouthful of cupcake.

“Well now that your belly is full of cupcake, do you have the energy to come outside? I have something to show you.” Louis stood up even though the dogs kept circling him.

Harry gave him a look, and then glanced down at his belly. “No?”

“Come on, Haz, just a second? Promise it’ll be worth it.” Harry groaned and held up his hands. Louis took them in his and helped Harry up from the couch. He pressed a kiss to his lips. “Thanks, love,” Louis muttered before he guided Harry towards the front door, the dogs at their heels.

“I’ll just stay in here then,” Niall said from behind them.

“Yes,” Louis said.

“I’m eating a cupcake.”

“Don’t eat the cupcakes! We have to save them!” Harry said, glancing back to see Niall had in fact picked up a cupcake.

“There’s like five hundred here. I’m eating one- Oh I know! I’ll take my own picture of the inside and post it in black and white.”

Louis rolled his eyes. “I don’t even want to know what you two got up to.” He pulled open the front door and the dogs ran out into the driveway.

It was misting outside, and Harry shivered a little. He was about to comment on being cold when his eyes caught the car in the driveway. Or rather the truck.

“Lou, that’s not ours.”

Louis was grinning. “Nope, I rented it. Mum is coming in me car with the rest of the family.” Harry stared at the pickup truck and followed Louis around to the back. In the bed of the truck was a piece of furniture wrapped in plastic to protect it from the rain.

“What is it?” Harry said, unable to guess what it was through the plastic.

Louis let go of him and opened up the back of the truck, climbing up into the bed. “Got it from Nan. She wanted us to have this. Would have given it to you herself but our schedules haven’t been lining up.”

“We would have made time,” Harry said watching as Louis pushed whatever it was to the edge of the bed. Now that he was staring at it for longer he was starting to make out the shape and his heart picked up. “Is that?” He reached forward. “Is this her rocking chair?”

Louis’ smile was blinding. “Yeah it is.”

Harry gripped the plastic and tried to reign in his emotions. It wouldn’t do to burst into tears right this second. Louis’ nan’s rocking chair was legendary. It had originally been her mother’s, and had been hand carved by Louis’ great-grandfather as a gift when they’d been expecting their first child. It was beautiful and sturdy, and according to Louis no one was allowed to sit in it except for his nan and his nan’s cat. Almost all of Harry’s encounters with Louis’ nan involved her sitting in this chair, rocking back and forth with a smile on her face. The fact that it was now in the back of a pickup truck that Louis had driven down from her house… that it was apparently being given to _them_.

“Lou,” Harry said.

Louis jumped down and cupped his cheeks. “I know. I already told her she didn’t have to but she wanted us to have it.”

Harry sniffed. “Lottie is going to kill us.”

Louis grinned and kissed his lips. “That’s why we’re gonna put it proudly on display in the Sprog’s room so she can see how perfect it looks, and hopefully that’ll spare us from her wrath.”

Harry laughed wetly and wrapped his arms around Louis as best he could with his belly in the way. “Oh, Louis. She really didn’t have to.”

Louis rubbed his back. “She said she expects to get lots of pictures of us in it with the Sprog. Think we can do that?”

Harry nodded and buried his face in the crook of Louis’ neck. “Of course, of course.”

“Alright, how about you get back inside and on the couch. Tell Niall to come out here so we can bring this in.” Harry sniffed as he pulled away. Louis was still beaming and he tried to return the smile. “Aw, love.” Louis leaned up and kissed him again. “If you get emotional about this what are you going to do when you open up all the other presents?”

“None of them will beat this,” Harry said, and it was mostly true. The rocking chair was too much. They’d been looking for the perfect one for way too long and suddenly they had it. “Did you know she was going to do this?”

Louis shook his head. “Nope. Didn’t know until mum told me to stop looking for rocking chairs last week. I guessed why since that was really the only explanation.”

Harry looked at the wrapped rocking chair again and let out a little sob. He tried to bite it back but it didn’t work out. At least when he looked at Louis he only was looking on with a fond smile. “I’m crying over furniture, Lou.”

Louis shrugged. “You’re crying over my nan’s rocking chair. Oh! And she knit a blanket. Almost forgot. It’s banana yellow. She thought it would be funny, something about it being the easiest fruit inspired blanket to make?”

Harry let out another sob because there was a story behind that. Louis’ nan had called him a few weeks ago complaining that all she could find were fruit onesies and she refused to have her grandchild dressed up as a fruit cup. It had devolved into a conversation about how much fruit accessories they could come up with for the Sprog.

Louis rubbed his back and kissed his temple. “Get inside, H. Call Nan and tell her thank you.”

Harry nodded, hugging Louis once more before he went inside. Niall didn’t question why he was crying, because Niall was a good egg. He settled onto the couch and grabbed his phone from the seat beside him. He steadied himself so he wasn’t crying before he pulled up Louis’ nan’s number and pressed “call”.

It rang twice before it picked up.

“Hello? Nan?” He felt himself starting to cry again, but that was okay. She was family.

“Hello dear,” she said, and Harry could hear her smiling. “I take it Louis made it back just fine in that ridiculous car he was driving?”

Harry laughed and nodded even though she couldn’t see him. “It is ridiculous.”

“I told him he could just hire a mover instead of driving down with it but he wouldn’t listen.”

“He’s not the best at listening is he?” Harry asked, looking up as he heard Niall and Louis walked into house, the click of the dogs’ nails on the floor pitter-pattering right behind them.

“Not in the least. But you do like it, right?”

“I love it,” he said. “Lou is moving it in the room with Niall right now.”

“I expect lots of pictures since I won’t be there today.”

“Of course. I’ll have Louis take a bunch and send them to you.”

“I want them printed out too. I know you boys bought me that fancy photo printer but it won’t hook up to my computer anymore and I want physical copies for the photo album I’m putting together.”

Harry bit his lip. “Of course. You know next time we’re up there we can try and have it hook back up to your computer.”

Louis’ nan made a dismissive sound. “Next time you’re up here we’ll be too busy with that child of yours. I expect they’ll be a handful knowing their father.”

Harry laughed and it made Louis look over at him as he and Niall passed by the couch. “You’re talking shit about me aren’t you?”

Harry grinned but didn’t respond to Louis. “I’m hoping a bit of me rubs off on the Sprog.”

It was Louis’ nan’s turn to laugh. “If what my daughter tells me is true, you were no better. Devils the both of you. I hope you’re ready for some late nights.”

Harry felt his heart warm a little as his hand drifted to his belly. “I’m looking forward to them.”

“You say that now, just you wait.”

“It’s all part of the fun, isn’t it?”

Louis’ nan was quiet for a moment. When she spoke it was soft. “Yes, I suppose it is.”


	8. october

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're soooo close to the end :) Hope to have the last chapter out by the weekend but it's going to be a long one!
> 
> Unbeta'd~ All mistakes are mine.

Harry was sore. Painfully, mind numbingly sore. His ankles were swollen, his back screamed every time he moved, and the muscles in his thighs were starting to quiver even when he wasn’t using them. The UK tour was brutal with multiple shows a week. The adrenaline got him through each show without worrying the fans, but the downtime was terrible. That plus all the promo they were packing in before the album dropped in November was ridiculous.

Louis had managed to make it so he was only on set for the minimum amount of time when they filmed their latest music video, but that had still been six hours. He had left the set so exhausted he could cry.

The only relief was that the Sprog had dropped the other day, making it easier for him to breathe. But it had the drawback that now he felt like he was racing against the clock. He was thirty-five weeks after all. Dr. Smith told him dropped was normal up to four weeks before the baby was due, but it was too soon. He’d thought he’d have until the middle of November, and now there was the looming anxiety that he would start labor any moment.

He’d known it was rare for male carrier to make it to forty weeks, much less forty-two, with most just making it past thirty-eight weeks, but Harry had hoped he could have gotten a little closer.

They’d at least finished the Ireland shows, so he didn’t have anymore flying to worry about. Sure Newcastle would be a bitch to drive to and he’d have to make Louis pull over every thirty minutes, but they’d manage.

That is, if he weren’t so fucking sore he thought he was about to die.

“Haz, love, you awake?” Louis asked. Harry opened his eye and saw Louis’ face right in front of him. He whined and Louis frowned before he reached out and ran his fingers over Harry’s forehead. “Where’s your pillow? This can’t be comfortable.”

“Nothing’s comfortable,” he said. It hurt to roll over and look for his body pillow but Louis was one step ahead of him.

“Here we go,” Louis said. Harry was unmoving as Louis started moving his body ever so slightly so he could wrap the body pillow into place. “This should be a little better. I brought you a hot water bottle for your lower back. Supposed to help with any cramps.”

“The yoga was supposed to help,” Harry said pathetically.

He saw the way Louis tried to suppress his smile and while a part of him was annoyed that Louis found pleasure in Harry’s suffering, another part of him was endeared. Louis still found him funny even when he was in the worst pain of his life.

“Want a massage, love? Won’t be as good as Teddy’s but he showed me what to do so I won’t hurt you.”

Teddy was the masseuse Louis had gotten for him when the first signs of his back going started to show, and while it hadn’t stopped the pain entirely, Teddy had assured both of them that it could be a lot worse. Harry refused to believe there was a worse pain than this.

He nodded feebly and Louis kissed his forehead. “I’m gonna need you to do me a huge favor, love.”

“I’m not rolling over.”

Louis sighed, but instead of protesting he walked around the bed and climbed onto the end of the bed. “Alright. I’m gonna start down here first.”

Harry whined as Louis removed one of his socks, but it quickly turned into a moan of pain. Louis’ hands might look delicate but he had strength behind every part of his body and Harry was reminded of that the moment he began working on his foot. He rubbed up on the sole of Harry’s foot, presumably trying to stimulate blood flow or something, but all Harry registered was relief.

Louis was using the heel of his palm to work into Harry’s arches and up to his toes. He did this a few times until Harry wiggled his toe, and then he moved up to his ankle. Harry hissed. It wasn’t from pain exactly, just the odd sensation of Louis touching his ankle and it not feeling right.

He closed his eyes and focused on his breathing while Louis worked. Occasionally a little moan or whimper would slip out, like when Louis started to rub against the bone of his ankle, but for the most part he stayed quiet.

Louis moved up to his calf after he was done with his ankle and Harry took a moment to glance at him. Louis’ face was concentration personified as he started to try and work out a knot in Harry’s calf.

Harry cried out then, his leg tightening. “Fuck, it hurts.”

Louis didn’t let up, but he did shush him. “It’s okay. I’m just trying to help.” He dropped a kiss on the closest skin he could find (Harry’s big toe) as he kept working the knot. “It’ll feel better once I’m done.”

Harry nodded because he knew this. He’d gotten enough massages in his life, but it still hurt. He felt the moment the knot released and Louis moved on, rubbing the rest of the calf. He sighed in relief when Louis bent his knee carefully because that was a sign that he was done.

“How are you doing?” Louis asked, and Harry could feel him moving up the bed.

Harry breathed out through his nose. “Alright. I think I can take off my shirt for you.”

“That would be perfect, love,” Louis said.

It wasn’t an easy task but Harry did get the shirt off so his back was bare for Louis to work on. He took a deep breath, preparing for what was coming next. It took a bit longer than he was expecting, so he jolted a bit in surprise when Louis’ hand touched him.

His hand was covered in something - lotion or…, “are you using our good lube?”

Louis hummed in agreement as he dug his palm into Harry’s lower back. “Best I could find on such short notice.”

Harry wrinkled his nose. “I’m going to feel gross.”

“I’ll give you a bath after I’m done, how about that?”

Instead of answering Harry just groaned because Louis had found a tightness right at the top of his arse. They fell silent as Louis worked his left side. Harry gripped his pillow as he tried to relax so the muscles didn’t tighten up worse. He knew from previous experience that most of his back came from his glutes being too tight so that where Louis was focusing most of his attention, but he did eventually move up Harry’s back.

Louis helped Harry arch his back a bit so he wasn’t curled up on himself anymore, relieving more pressure on his spine. His belly wasn’t easy to move and Louis reached around him to help lift it, moving it up with Harry’s body.

Harry moaned in relief when Louis took the weight of his belly in his hand and he reached down to keep his hand there, lube covered or not.

“That feel better?” Louis asked.

Harry nodded quickly. “So much better. Stay like this forever.”

Louis laughed and he folded up behind Harry, spooning him a little awkwardly. He kissed behind Harry’s ear as he lifted his belly just a bit more so he could scoop under it and hold it up entirely with his arm. “Alright, love. But I’m gonna need to roll you over at some point so I can do your other side.”

“No,” Harry moaned.

Louis kissed his neck and Harry shivered.

_Fucking pregnancy hormones._

“If you let me finish the massage I’ll cuddle you however you want, how’s that?”

Slowly Harry looked back at Louis and once he met his eyes he nodded. Louis rewarded him with a kiss on the lips and then he was pulling away. He didn’t drop Harry’s belly all at once. He eased the weight back onto the bed, though no matter how slow he was it still hurt.

They worked as a team so Harry could roll over and get in a similar position with the body pillow. Once he was vaguely comfortable Louis began the work all over again. He started at Harry’s foot, mimicking his earlier actions. He made his way up Harry's leg methodically and this time Harry gave into what he was doing much easier. 

The promise of cuddles at the end of the massage was enough motivation.

Louis got to his back and again he moved up the bed so he was behind Harry. He added more lube to his hands so there wasn't as much friction when he rubbed Harry's other cheek.

Harry moaned at Louis' touch, arching a little into it.

"That's much better, love," Louis muttered. "You're feeling so much better now."

Harry hummed in agreement. He wasn't as tense anymore and so Louis' touch was doing something completely different to him this time. He was starting to get hard which wasn't a surprise, exactly. He'd had pretty active hormones right up until a couple weeks ago when the exhaustion started to catch up to him. The familiar feeling of warmth coiling in his stomach was comforting, and he hoped that Louis would be willing to help him out with it once he was done. 

When Louis finished with his back he reached around to help Harry arch and take the weight of his stomach off of him. Harry moaned in relief, and also because Louis' hand grazed against his cock.

He heard Louis suck in a breath before he dropped a kiss on Harry's shoulder. "I can see your feeling better."

Harry moaned again. "Pretty sure you can't see it from under my belly."

"It's a beautiful belly. And it's holding our little Sprog." Louis' hand rubbed over Harry's stomach for a moment before it trailed up to his sensitive nipples. His mouth pressed against Harry's ear. "Are these sore today?"

He pinched Harry's nipple.

Harry gasped and if he weren't already arching back he would be trying it now because that felt so _good_. 

"Like that?" Louis asked, the smug fuck. He knew that answer already. 

"Yes," Harry hissed in pleasure as Louis twisted and pulled on his nipple. They were already hard and with this kind of stimulation Harry knew they'd stay puffy and red. "Gonna start leaking soon if you - ah - keep this up."

Louis seemed to like that because he pinched harder and tugged.

Harry's hand dropped to his cock. Even though he hadn't seen it with his own eyes in months he still found it no problem, wrapped around the base and stroking. He thumbed over the slit even though he was dry. His body wasn't producing semen at this point, and that meant he would come dry. But it didn't matter. The pain was okay, especially when paired with what Louis was doing to his nipples.

"Wanna fuck you," Louis whispered. "Wanna eat you out. Gonna make you come so good."

Harry whined, nodding in agreement. "Please, please. We can do it like this. No pressure on my back."

He felt Louis nod as well and then suddenly he was pulling away. Harry tried to reach for him but Louis made a soothing sound as he put one hand on Harry’s back. “Just getting the lube, love. Need you nice and wet, don’t I?” Harry relaxed as he realized that was true, they did need lube or else this wouldn’t work. As he felt Louis roll back behind him he tried to lift his leg so he’d have access. Louis tutted at him and put his hand on his hip. “Not yet. I’ll do all the work.”

Harry gripped his pillow as he waited for Louis’ next move. He heard the snick of the cap opening, and then felt Louis’ hand slide down to his thigh. Louis coaxed his thighs apart, moving one further up the body pillow so he had access to Harry’s arse.

The first touch was a little cooler than Harry was expecting, but it warmed up quickly as Louis’ pressed his finger inside him. Harry moaned, oversensitive, especially with his hand still working his cock. Louis worked his fingers, getting Harry wet so he could take his cock. The thought sent a shiver up Harry’s spine.

It wasn’t even that hard keeping his legs spread as Louis pumped his fingers in and out of his hole. Harry was so relaxed, the pain from earlier completely forgotten. All he felt now was the pleasure coursing through him, building, and building.

“I’m close,” he managed to choke out.

Louis’ fingers curled inside him, he was up to three now, and Harry was starting to feel like he was dripping. He cried out in pleasure, tipping over the edge and he came dryly over his hand. His body shuddered and he dropped his hand from his cock. He was tingling and blissful. It allowed Louis to slip his fingers out of him with no protest, and Harry was completely relaxed when Louis moved behind him.

He felt the blunt tip of Louis’ cock against his hole and he didn’t know when exactly Louis had gotten naked but he like this development.

Louis pressed inside him, and Harry moaned. He was thicker than his fingers and so the stretch still came. It was hot and welcomed and all Harry wanted to do was buck back down into Louis’ hips. But that wasn’t possible from this position. Louis was in control of the pace and he seemed to be content with shallow rolls of his hips, his cock only halfway inside Harry.

“Need more,” Harry muttered, trying to reach back to Louis’ hand.

Louis indulged him on that regard, but his pace stayed the same. Slow and shallow. Not even an in and out, just gentle rolling. “Just enjoy this,” Louis finally whispered when Harry repeated himself. “You feel so good.”

Harry groaned and he tried to curl in on himself to get some more leverage.

“Ah ah, no, arch your back for me. Don’t wanna undo all the work I just did.” Louis didn’t even sound out of breath, which was unfair since he was fucking Harry right now.

He slipped out for a moment and Harry whined at the loss. Louis was just changing position though, spooning in closer. It brought their hips closer together when he pushed his cock back inside Harry, and Harry gasped in pleasure. It only increased when Louis’ hand crept over his side to cup under his belly and lifting it higher.

Harry’s eyes squeezed shut. Louis was fully inside him now, and the rolls of his hips felt less like a tease. And the way he was holding his stomach made Harry feel lighter than he had in months.

Louis kissed the back of his neck. His breaths were coming in short pants, finally showing that he was affected by what they were doing. Harry still couldn’t really push back but it was okay. Louis was in control. It was still slow but it was deeper now, bringing Harry more pleasure with every thrust.

“Need more?” Louis asked, hips rocking. Harry shook his head and then nodded. He didn’t know what he needed. All he really needed was Louis. And he had him. Louis was wrapped around him. He had everything right here. He felt kisses on his neck and trailing down to his shoulder, feather light to compliment the way Louis was stroking the underside of his belly. “You’re so perfect,” Louis whispered. “So, so perfect. I’m lucky to have you.”

Harry moaned. “I’m the,” he paused to gasp, “the lucky one.”

Louis laughed against his shoulder. “Both lucky then.”

All Harry could do was moan in agreement as Louis’ hand dropped slowly from his belly to his cock. That one action made everything feel like it was on fast forward. Harry no longer wanted the slow pace they’d had this whole time. He wanted a race to the finish line. He wanted to come, and he wanted Louis to come, and for them to have to sleep in the mess.

It was so sudden it almost punched the breath out of him, and Louis must have felt it too because his thrusts got a bit more powerful. He changed the angle of his thrusts, picking up speed like he was chasing his orgasm. Harry loved it. He loved Louis. He loved his life. He’d even love the pain he had to go through if it meant evenings like this.

That was the thought that was on his mind when he felt Louis’ hips stutter. He could feel the pulse of Louis’ cock inside him, filling him up with his come. His eyes closed as his world became comprised entirely of Louis’ hand and his cock for a moment. It was the only thing he could focus on now. Louis’ hand was going fast, the leftover lube helping ease the way, allowing him to go faster.

Harry was left shaking as he felt the heat explode from his stomach, his orgasm washing over him for a second time. By the time he came down from seeing stars in front of his eyes Louis had settled in behind him. They were spooning in their proper positions with Louis’ arms wrapped around his waist, hands on his belly.

“You back here with me?” He asked.

“Think so,” Harry said, mouth dry. “Gonna need water soon though.”

“I’ll get you some.” Louis didn’t make any move to get up just yet. “Your back doing better?”

Harry thought about it. He was still tingling from his orgasms and the sex, but he could feel the undercurrent of exhaustion that was constantly there. He ignored that. “Yeah. I’m much better.”

The exhaustion wasn’t going to be permanent after all. Soon - very soon - they’d be welcoming their Sprog into the world. Harry could handle a little bit of soreness as long as Louis was here.


	9. november

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cries. DO YOU KNOW HOW LONG THIS CHAPTER IS!? IT NEVER ENDED. But it's here now! :D Happy Larry Hug Day everyone!!!
> 
> A note: this chapter deals with (non-graphic) child birth and hospitals. If you have any concerns about the content of the chapter just hit me up on [tumblr](http://sadaveniren.tumblr.com) and I'll give you the nitty gritty :)
> 
> Unbeta'd as always. I'll be giving the whole fic a run through to try and fix errors. OTL Thank you all for sticking with this fluff piece for so long! I hope you enjoyed it!!
> 
> Finally! I added a 10th chapter which will be posted along with this one so please go ahead and read that! <3

Louis came out of sleep when the light from the bathroom shined on his face. He groaned and rolled over, knowing already that Harry wasn’t in bed. He hadn’t been able to sleep through the night for the last week or so, and because of that Louis hadn’t either. The bathroom door shut, cutting off the light, and Louis felt himself drifting back to sleep.

“Oh fuck.”

Louis’ eyes snapped open.

That had been Harry.

He scrambled out of bed and rushed to the ensuite door not even bothering to knock before he threw it open. Harry was standing naked by his sink, gripping the edge so hard his knuckles were white. The rest of his body was flushed red and he was panting.

“What’s the matter?” Louis asked, stepping into the bathroom.

Harry sucked in a deep breath. “Think my water broke.”

Louis’ eyes darted down to Harry’s feet where, yes indeed, there was a small puddle. He stood frozen for a second before everything went into fast forward.

“I’m getting Anne and calling the doctor,” he said even as he was backing out of the bathroom. He had the forethought to grab one of the frocks Harry had left crumpled up on the floor and run back into the bathroom to give to him. He gave Harry’s cheek a kiss. “Put this on if you can, love,” he said and then he was off.

All he could think as he ran down the hall was that he was grateful Anne had already moved into the guest room earlier this week. She’d moved in so Harry wouldn’t be alone while Louis attended the promo he was contractually obligated to attend. And also, at least in the back of Louis’ mind, so when this exact thing happened the two of them weren’t left to deal with it on their own.

He knocked hard on the guest room door before he turned the handle and opened the door just a bit. “Anne? Harry’s water broke.”

He heard her curse and the bed creaked before she was standing in the doorframe in her pajamas, eyes wide even though she looked half-asleep. “Have you called the doctor?”

“About to,” Louis said holding up his phone. He caught a glimpse at the time and winced in sympathy for Dr. Smith. It was 3:37 in the morning. “Can you-?”

“Where is he?” Anne asked as she pushed him to the side. “Robin? Robin, get up. You’re going to drive us.”

Louis stepped back so he was following Anne while he unlocked his phone and dialed Dr. Smith. Harry hadn’t moved except to slip on the frock and Anne wrapped her arms around him, urging him out of the bathroom. Louis watched all of this and absentmindedly dropped a towel on the puddle Harry had left so it wouldn’t just sit there while they were gone.

“Hello, Hampstead Maternity Clinic, Melissa speaking, how may I help you?” The receptionist answered.

“Hi, yes. This is Louis Tomlinson, my partner is Harry Styles, a patient of yours. His water’s just broke.” He chewed on the skin around his thumbnail as he listened to Melissa tell him to remain calm (which he was doing remarkably well, _thank you_ ) and to drive to the hospital where nurses would be alerted, all while watching Anne get Harry into a jacket so he wouldn’t be so cold.

“Do you think you’ll be able to do that, Mr. Tomlinson, or will you need an ambulance?”

“We should be fine, thank you so much.”

“You’re welcome. One more bit of information for the doctor if you don’t mind, have contractions started?”

Louis glanced over at Harry hobbling out of the room and he quickly followed after them. “Haz, have contractions started?”

Harry winced as he started down the stairs, Anne helping him. “Yeah. ‘s what woke me up. Haven’t had another one yet.”

Louis put the phone back to his ear. “Yes he woke up to one, but hasn’t had a second one.”

He could hear her tapping away at her keyboard as he waited at the top of the stairs. His other option was to crowd Harry but he knew that wouldn’t be the best move. Robin stopped beside him and clapped a hand on Louis’ shoulder. “You’re gonna need a bit more clothes, son.”

Louis glanced down and saw that he was in just his boxers but before he could respond Melissa was talking again and Harry was letting out a pained cry just as he reached the bottom of the stairs.

“Sorry, you’ll need to repeat that I think he just had another contraction.”

Melissa didn’t seem flustered. “That’s good. I just wanted to confirm that you’d be going to St. Mary’s.”

“Yes, that’s what was recommended for us,” Louis said, getting antsy as he watched Anne soothe Harry through the contraction. That should be his place.

“Alright, they have been informed that you are on your way.”

“Great thanks, shouldn’t be more than twenty minutes.” He hung up before she could say goodbye, which was rude but he couldn’t help it. He wanted to be beside Harry. “Love, come on, let’s get you to the car. The hospital knows you’re coming.”

“Don’t get ahead of yourself,” Robin said from behind him. “Grabbed you some clothes. And you too, missy,” he said handing both Anne and Louis clothes. “Put those on while I start the car.”

Louis did as he was asked while trying not to take his eyes off Harry, which was hard because them being downstairs meant the dogs were swarming around them for attention. He ignored them and as soon as he was dressed in joggers and a hoodie he was beside Harry, pulling him gently off the wall and into his arms. “Here we go, love.” He stood on his tiptoes to kiss his temple. “Just gotta get you into the car.”

“You’ll need to call your mum,” Harry muttered and Louis shushed him.

“I have everything under control. You don’t have to worry about anything except making sure you remember to breathe through the contractions.”

Harry managed to laugh a little at that. Anne came to his other side and the three of them made their way to the door, dogs trailing behind them. Louis nudged them away by the time they reached the front door and he let go of Harry just long enough to lock up before going right back to his side.

Getting Harry in the backseat of the car was a task, and it would probably be easier if he’d sat up front, but that wasn’t the safest option, or what he wanted. It was also impeded by a contraction hitting again just as he climbing in.

“How long is that?” Anne asked once the contraction passed.

Louis glanced at his phone and saw it was 3:53. He pulled up when he ended the call with the doctor’s office and winced. “Five minutes, there abouts.”

Anne nodded. “That’s good. You’re doing good, Harry.”

Harry whimpered as he tried to get comfortable in the middle seat. His belly had dropped so he had to spread his legs out wide on both sides to accommodate it. Louis started to reach over and then thought better of it. “Want me to lift the weight?” He asked.

Harry nodded but then quickly shook his head. “No. Don’t even think about my stomach right now.” The car jolted forward and Harry let out a whine. Louis’ eyes darted to Anne in concern - were the contractions getting faster that quick? - but then Harry shook his head. “Not- not another one. Just discomfort.” He let out a deep sigh and opened his eye. “Hey Lou.”

“Yeah?”

“We’re gonna be meeting the Sprog soon.”

Louis could feel how he lit up, even with the exhaustion creeping back in now that he was seated in the car. “We _are_.” His eyes dropped to Harry’s stomach and he had to resist the urge to pet it. “Hope you’re as excited to meet us. You have so many people who are just ready to spoil you rotten, me and your mum most of all.” Anne snorted beside him. Louis looked over at her. “What?”

“The grandmums will be holding the crown for most spoiling, thank you. And have you called _your_ mum.”

Louis flushed because in the excitement he’d forgotten but he tried not to let it show on his face. “As a matter of fact, no, I have not, but that’s because I was waiting.”

“It’s going to take her a couple hours to get down here, so you should do that. She will kill you if she misses this.”

Louis fished into his jogger’s pockets for his cellphone and dialed his mother just as another contraction hit Harry. He was shushing him and pressing kisses to his cheek and neck when his mum picked up.

“Boo? What’s wrong?”

“Hey mum, Harry’s water broke. We’re on the way to the hospital.”

He heard her shuffling around, whispering to Dan, and he waited. Anne held up four fingers which he guessed was to tell him how many minutes it had been since the last contraction. Louis was glad Anne was there to keep track of these things because if it had just been the two of them… well he’s pretty positive they would have worked everything out together, it was just nice to have her have their back.

“Mum?” He asked when his mum still hadn’t come back on the phone.

“Sorry, I’m here. Just trying to get dressed and plan. I’ll be down there as soon as possible. Dan’s going to come down with the girls and the babies after school lets out.”

“Mum, it’s fine. Take your time please.”

He heard her take a deep breath. “You’re right. I’m just very excited for you both and want everything to go smoothly.”

“Everything is going to be perfect, mum. I’ll see you in a couple hours.”

“Tell Anne I’ll be texting her. Figure you might not have your phone.”

“I’ll make sure she knows.”

“Tell Harry I love him and to remember the breathing that we’ve practiced.”

“We love you too. Bye mum.”

“Bye Boo,” his mum said before hanging up.

Louis pocketed his phone and turned his attention back to Harry. He was leaning against Anne’s shoulder taking deep breaths with his eyes closed. Louis could see a sheen of sweat forming on his brow and Louis reached over to caress his cheek. Harry’s eyes fluttered open.

“Mum says she loves you, and to remember your breathing.”

Harry cracked a smile. “I’m trying. Kinda hard with the shooting pain going through my body.”

Anne cooed at him and kissed the top of his head. “This is just revenge for you taking almost seventeen hours.”

Louis had to bite his lip to stop from smiling when Harry whined. “Not fair. The Sprog wouldn’t do that to me. They’ll be out within the hour, right Lou?”

Louis knew that probably wasn’t going to happen. Harry’s contractions weren’t nearly long enough, or happening frequently enough. A lot could change quickly of course, but Louis was prepared to wait awhile before he got to meet the Sprog. He didn’t tell Harry that though. “Exactly, love. Gonna be out so soon we’re gonna be lucky to get to the hospital on time.” He kissed Harry’s nose and when he pulled away Harry was practically beaming.

At least until another contraction hit him.

Harry squeezed his hand as the contraction passed. “That. Sucked.”

“It’ll be over soon,” Anne said as she ran her fingers through his hair.

“Not to interrupt, but we’re almost here. You didn’t happen to catch where we were supposed to pull in?” Robin asked.

Louis winced and looked away from Harry. “Uh, the front?”

To Robin’s credit he didn’t say anything and pulled into the drop off near the emergency room. No one was waiting outside so Louis climbed out and jogged inside after he pulled up the hood of his sweater. The waiting room was busier than he was expecting for 4:15 in the morning with a smattering of about fifteen people spread out in all the chairs. No one was at reception though. Louis headed over.

The receptionist smiled at him. “Good morning.”

“Morning.” He felt self-conscious with the hood up so he pulled it down before he continued. “My partner’s water broke? Our doctor should have put a call through that we on our way in to get checked out.”

He watched as the receptionist began to type at his computer before reaching over and picking up the phone. “One minute.”

Louis waited, foot tapping. He knew intellectually that there wasn’t that big of a rush, his mum had told him about a ton of different births over the years, but that didn’t stop him from feeling antsy. None of those stories involved _Harry_ or _their_ child.

The receptionist hung up. “The nurses are on their way over. Is your partner waiting outside?”

Louis nodded. “Yeah. He’s in the car with his mum. Right out there.”

“You can wait outside then. They’ll be out in a few minutes.”

“Thanks,” Louis said before he turned and left the waiting room.

Harry was sitting on the edge of the seat with his legs hanging out the door when he got outside. Louis tsked as he got closer, wrapping Harry in a loose hug, trying to be careful of his stomach.

“Aren’t you cold, baby?”

Harry shook his head. “Feel really warm. Probably the adrenaline. Am I gonna go in soon?”

Louis nodded and leaned over for a quick kiss. “Nurses are on their way. Think we pulled into the wrong entrance but the receptionist was too polite to tell me I’d fucked up.”

Harry laughed. “I don’t know why people don’t call you on your shit more often.”

“Hey! When am I ever pulling shit that needs called on?”

He knew the exact look Harry was going to give him but it still sent a thrill down his spine when he saw it. “Right this second.”

“Hey,” Louis said. He drew out the word until Harry laughed. That is what he lived for after all.

“Think that crew is for you,” Anne said from behind Harry and Louis pulled away to look at the entrances.

There were four nurses, one pushing a wheelchair. Louis waved at them and they headed over to them.

“Sorry for the wait, Mr. Tomlinson,” the nurse pushing the wheelchair said before she turned her attention to Harry.

“It’s alright,” Louis said as he stepped back so they had access to Harry. 

He wasn’t sure they heard him at all as they got Harry into the wheelchair and began peppering him with questions. Louis was worried he’d have to step in and answer them but Harry was doing a fantastic job of handling them. Louis was about to follow the three nurses and Harry but the fourth held him back.

“You’ll be able to see him after he’s checked out. I can take you to the private waiting room we have set up for you and your families if you’d like.”

Louis watched as the sliding doors shut behind Harry and he snapped his attention back to the nurse. He’d known he wouldn’t be able to be with Harry the whole time, so there was no reason to feel upset. He’d see Harry soon. “Yes, that’d be great. I don’t know how many people we’re going to be having. Might overrun you so I apologize in advance.”

The nurse just smiled. “I look forward to it. I’m Diana. I’ll be the main nurse for Harry today.”

Louis scrunched up his nose as the first line of the chorus to Diana played in his head just like it always did whenever this happened. “Louis.” He looked behind him. “Anne’s Harry’s mum, she’s in the car. She’ll probably be coming up with me to the waiting room while Robin parks the car.”

“No problem.” Diana smiled at Anne as she climbed out of the car. “We ready to head inside?”

Anne nodded. “Lead the way.”

As they walked Diana went over the basic outline what was going to happen. Louis already knew all of this but he was glad something filled the silence that wasn’t awkward small talk. They were guided through a maze of hallways and Louis had absolutely no idea how any of it connected together until they were finally led into a small room. The walls were lined with couches and there were racks full of magazines, as well as a television with some video game consoles hooked up.

“We can bring you guys up breakfast if you need,” Diana said. “And that couch over there pulls out into a bed in case you need to sleep.”

“Don’t think I’m gonna be sleeping much if I’m being honest,” Louis said. He really wanted to get back to Harry. This was a test of patience.

“Excited?”

“Like you wouldn’t believe.”

She gave him a soft smile. “Someone will come grab you when he’s ready for visitors. There can only be one at a time because of space.”

“That’s fine,” Anne said. “Louis will be going first.”

Louis sent her a grateful smile. He’d known there would space issues. Male carriers always had more nurses attending them because of the complications that could arise. It was why the partner wasn’t allowed in the delivery room even if the pregnancy had been problem free. The thought of it was sending anxiety shooting through him.

Once the nurse left Louis collapsed onto the couch and Anne quickly joined him. She wrapped an arm around him as she settled down next to him. “How are you really holding up?”

He let out a breath. “Nervous as fuck.” He knew he’d get away with the curse in front of her because of the circumstances. “Wish I could be there with him right now.”

“You’ll be there soon.” She kissed his temple.

“I need to call Des,” Louis suddenly remembered, pulling away so he could search his pockets for his phone.

Anne’s hand on his shoulder stopped him. “I already called while you were getting the nurses. And I texted Gemma. He’s on his way now, but Gemma isn’t awake yet. You need to relax.” She pulled him back into her embrace and started running her fingers through his hair. 

Louis closed his eyes and tried to take deep calming breaths. It was impossible. He was too high strung, constantly on alert. His eyes popped open when he heard someone walk by the door and nothing Anne did was helping. He took to pacing the length of the room, hands fidgeting in the pockets of his hoodie, until a nurse brought Robin into the room. She didn’t have any updates of Harry though, and it just made Louis more antsy.

Anne had curled up on the couch with a blanket the nurse had brought and Robin was snoring lightly in one of the more plush chairs when another nurse finally popped her head in.

“Can I see him?”

She smiled, gesturing him to follow her. Louis cast a look at Anne and Robin who were still sleeping before he put his phone down on the table in front of the couch Anne was sleeping on. Once they were out in the hallway she began to fill him in.

“Your partner’s water broke, but he’s currently only dilated two centimeters. However contractions have started and they are coming about five to six minutes apart right now. We’ll be watching him closely over the next couple of hours and once he’s fully dilated we can deliver.” She told him all of this with an easy smile but Louis could barely process it.

“Do we… Is there any guess how long this’ll take? I just know he’s hoping for it to be over quickly.”

“Well labor is always tough to estimate. It could take a few hours to even get to three centimeters but after he does it should go relatively quickly. No more than six usually.”

Louis did not blanch but it was a near thing. Harry was going to be disappointed. He was lead down a series of hallways that he knew he wouldn’t be able to navigate until the nurse stopped in front of a closed door. 

“Here we are,” she said as if he wouldn’t be able to make the connection about why they were stopping. “You’re free to stay until we’re ready to deliver and he’s also allowed other visitors, but only one at a time. Let a nurse know if you want to switch out.” She opened the door for him and Louis thanked her before ducking inside.

There was only one other nurse inside the room at the moment but Louis didn’t pay her any mind, she seemed busy enough with her own work. Instead he focused on Harry who was sitting up in the bed with his eyes closed. Louis made his way over to the side of the bed, dropping into the seat that was already set up before he took Harry’s hand in his.

Harry didn’t even open his eyes. Louis raised his hands to his lips. “Hey, love.” He watched as Harry smiled, the grimace his face was sporting slowly fading away. “The family phone tree has been activated.”

“That’s good.” He suddenly tightened his grip on Louis’ hand and let out a whimper. Louis could only watch helplessly as a contraction hit him causing his face to contort again. Out of the corner of his eye he could see the nurse watching with a calculating eye and it was only because he knew she was taking notes about how long the contraction lasted that he didn’t snap at her to do something. It killed him to see Harry in this kind of pain.

The contraction passed and Harry’s grip slackened but Louis’ didn’t. He brought Harry’s hand back to his lips. “You’re gonna be okay.”

Harry let out a small whine. “These contractions fucking suck. Can’t even hold a proper conversation because they keep hitting me every like five minutes or something and they last forever.”

Louis didn’t know what to say so he just leaned over and kissed his cheek before fussing over him. He brushed Harry’s hair back with his fingers before tilting his head so he could kiss him. “You’re amazing.” That brought a smile to Harry’s face. “How about I talk and you just sit there and listen your way through these contractions?”

“Love your voice,” Harry muttered. “Could fall asleep to that voice.”

Louis smiled and kissed his knuckles again. “Think you’ll be able to sleep?”

Harry laughed and it was one of the best things Louis had heard all morning. “Where’s that machine that let’s you feel what I’m feeling? If you think I’m gonna be able to sleep through this pain you overestimate my pain tolerance.”

“Well to be fair, it is pretty high. We’ve tested it on multiple occasions.”

“Oh fuck off,” Harry said. “You can’t bring up that kind of stuff while I’m like this. Sending my body all sorts of mixed messages.”

“Sorry love. Won’t happen again.” Louis knew his smile was mischievous but Harry still hadn’t really opened his eyes so he couldn’t see the way Louis was sneaking his hand to his side to pinch him until it happened.

Harry yelped and jolted a little. “Fucking hell.”

“Did that hurt?”

“Not compared to these fucking contractions!” Louis held his breath, waiting for the next one to come right after Harry had said that, but nothing happened.

He reached out to pinch Harry again, and there it was. Harry seized up, gasping through the pain of the next contraction. There wasn’t much he could do except hold Harry’s hand and keep talking as he went through it. It went on like this, Louis talking and Harry trying to engage during the breaks between contractions.

Occasionally a nurse would interrupt them to check on Harry, and Louis had to admit, it was a little strange at first watching someone else peek down in between his legs. He wasn’t sure he would ever get over it, and he was kinda glad he wouldn’t be there for the delivery for that reason. Watching other people touch Harry, even in a completely professional manner was still foreign to him, and left him feeling uncomfortable.

Harry at least seemed to not mind it, barely paying the nurses any attention while they did their work. So that was something.

There wasn’t a clock in the room so Louis had no idea how long he stayed with Harry, but the sun rose, even if it was hidden behind grey clouds, and some of the nurses went off shift. They offered to bring Harry some food, but he declined, trying to stick only to water to stay hydrated.

The second time they offered him breakfast Harry nudged Louis instead. “You should go get food. It’s definitely daytime.”

“I don’t want to leave you,” Louis said.

“You need to eat though. Eat and check your emails. You heard the last nurse, I’m still only two fucking centimeters because my body hates me and wants me to suffer.”

Louis kissed Harry’s cheek, choosing not to indulge his dramatics. “I’ll go get breakfast if it makes you feel better. Do you want me to grab your mom?”

“Could you?” Harry groaned in discomfort and it only made it harder for Louis to get up and leave his side.

“Sure. I’ll be back soon.” He kissed Harry again before he politely asked a nurse to take him back to the waiting room.

Des and his mum were there when he got back. He greeted both of them with only a little case of nerves, and they were nice enough not to bring up the way he was fidgeting.

“Harry wants me to grab some breakfast for myself,” he said as he played with his hands. “So I’m gonna run down to the lobby-thing and try and find something to eat.”

“We can bring something up here,” the nurse who had accompanied him back to the room said, lingering in the doorway where she was going to take Anne in. “So you can have some privacy.”

His mum snorted. “Think the poor boy needs to walk around instead of be stuck in here. Otherwise he’s gonna cause everyone hell.”

“You can still bring breakfast up for them,” Louis said. “But I should be fine. Not like I’m royalty or anything.”

The nurse smiled at him. “You know, they were able to be here privately because they stayed in the rooms we gave them.”

He heard everyone else laugh but he just rolled his eyes. He understood what she was saying but he just couldn’t stay in one place. Taking the walk down to get food would probably be great at expending some of the energy that was building up inside of him. He hugged his mum before he headed downstairs, following the vague directions the nurse had given him to try and find something small to eat.

The line at the small hospital cafe was blessedly short, probably because it was past morning rush. Louis was able to get himself a couple pastries and a large coffee that would hopefully get him through until noon, or the Sprog’s birth. He thanked the cashier with a tired smile before leaving the line to sit in one of the many empty tables around the cafe. He put his coffee down on a table that was a little out of hte way, intent on sitting down and trying to relax for five minutes.

“Um, excuse me?”

_Fuck._

Louis turned around to see two girls standing there. One looked to be a little older than Lottie with long brown hair, while the other had all of her hair tucked up under a knitted cap and looked closer to Fizzy’s age. He didn’t recognize either of them, but he could tell immediately they were fans. Just what he needed. He was really not in the right mindset to interact with fans. But he couldn’t just send them off and risk them making a post about meeting him here and just _fuck_. He didn’t have the braincells for this.

The girls both looked like they were about to die but were trying to compose themselves. Louis could respect that. It was exactly how he felt.

“You’re Louis Tomlinson,” the girl in the cap said.

He looked down at himself. “Would you look at that. Glad I decided to inhabit a good body this time.” Both girls giggled at his antics, and so far they were respectfully keeping their distance. Louis could handle this. “Is there anything I can do for you?”

“Oh!” The same girl said as she fumbled with her phone. “Could we get a picture? Maybe?”

“We totally understand if you can’t, or like don’t want to. Just thought we’d ask.”

Louis smiled at them. They were being polite so he decided he’d do what he could. “Sorry, I look like shit, but I can sign something if you’d like?”

They both nodded immediately only to quickly realize they didn’t have a pen. The girl with long hair flailed for a moment, looking around frantically, but there really weren’t that many people around just handing out extra pens.

“Gift shop?” He asked before he took a sip of his coffee.

The girls whispered at each other before the long haired girl ran off to the gift shop, leaving him with the other girl. He smiled at her.

“Thank you _so much_ for doing this,” she said.

“It’s no problem. Not in a rush.” A little white lie, but he did _not_ want her finding out the truth.

She nodded and he could see her battle with her next question so he already knew it was coming when she asked, “Can I ask why you’re here?”

And he was prepared. “Harry has an appointment.”

He watched as she physically tapped down the urge to squeal. “Oh! Um, tell him I said hi, or like, wish him well? All the fans are really excited for you both.”

“Thanks, love. What brings you here? Is it the scones? They look good.”

Her face dropped a little. “I have an appointment too.”

And Louis officially felt like an idiot. Of course she wasn’t here for shits and giggles. This was a hospital and she was wearing a knitted cap that, now that he looked, had no signs of hair peeking out. He was suddenly very glad he’d agreed to sign something for them.

The other girl returned then, triumphant with a notebook and pen. “Thank you so, so, _so_ much for doing this,” she gushed. “It means the world to us.”

He smiled as he fell into “Pop Star” mode. “Like I was telling your… friend?”

“Sister!” She chirped. “My little baby sister.”

The other girl practically squawked as she was pulled into a hug. “I’m not a baby anymore.” She playfully shoved her sister off. “I’m practically an adult now.”

“Sixteen isn’t going to make you an adult.”

“Afraid your big sis is right, love. I’m almost twice that age and I’m still not an adult.”

This sent both girls into a titter fest as they protested him being “almost thirty” and not an adult.

“Now, who do I make these out to?” He asked to interrupt them.

“Oh! Well I’m Ellen,” the long haired sister said, “and this is Ava.”

Louis leaned down to sign the first page of the notebook. “Lovely names. Me and H-,” he cut himself off and when he glanced up at the girls they were staring wide-eyed at him. _Fuck it._ Saying this wouldn’t be that harmful. “If the Sprog is a girl we’re gonna her Ava. We think.” The look on Ava’s face was one of the moments that was gonna stay with him forever. She seemed stunned and both girls were silent as he finished the autographs. He handed the notebook to Ellen. “It was lovely to meet you both.”

That seemed to snap them out of their stupor and they both thanked him profusely.

“Can I have a hug?” Ava asked.

Louis nodded, holding open his arms. He hugged her tight before he whispered, “you be strong, okay?”

Ava was sniffing when she pulled away. “Thank you again.”

His hug with Ellen was shorter. “No problem,” he said. “Can you just do one favor for me and not post about this til this afternoon? Or tomorrow? And not mention where you met me? I really don’t need Haz to get mobbed.”

Both girls immediately nodded. “Of course.”

“No definitely.”

Louis watched them leave and his business smile dropped when they were a safe distance away. He needed a fucking cigarette. He checked his phone to see if anyone had texted him updates but there was nothing. He stuffed his face with one of the pastries, devouring it in three big bites before tucking the scone away in his hoodie pocket. He grabbed his coffee and looked around for the sign that pointed towards the smoker’s section.

It wasn’t until he stepped outside into the small alley that he realized he didn’t have a pack on him. And it wasn’t like the hospital gift shop was going to sell them. He glanced around the scattering of people who were out here already, trying to guess which one he could bum a cigarette off of. The trio of nurses that were finishing up were out which left him with an off-duty security officer and a man who looked about Des’ age. Louis guessed he was either a patient or waiting for one. He looked friendly enough though, so Louis headed over to him and sat down on the bench next to his.

“Hey, can I bum one off of you?” Louis asked.

The man looked at him and Louis could see the way the man was examining him: exhausted face, joggers and a hoodie, Louis knew he looked vaguely pathetic.

“Sure, mate,” the guy said, pulling out his pack and handing Louis one. He even offered Louis a light and was nice enough to wait until Louis had taken a long drag to ask, “rough night?”

Louis nodded. “Partner’s water broke.”

The guy winced sympathetically. “Tough labor?”

“Long. Or well, it’s only been five hours? But not much progress. I think he was hoping for it to be a lot shorter.”

The man chuckled before he put out his cigarette and stood up. “Good luck, alright?”

Louis raised his hand in thanks and sat back on the bench. The alley was quiet and he let himself enjoy it. He was still nervous as hell, and had an itching nerve to check his phone that wouldn’t leave him. He hadn’t felt it vibrate with an update though, and checking it obsessively wasn’t going to help.

He finished his cigarette which left him with lukewarm coffee. Not the most appealing thing. He sighed, binned the coffee cup and finally gave into checking his phone. He only had work emails and he couldn’t deal with those.

So he did the next best thing. He called Jeff.

“Hello?” Jeff sounded like he had just woken up, which made sense. It was only two in the morning over there.

“Sorry, it’s me, Louis.”

“I have caller ID, so I knew that. What’s so important you need me in the middle of the night then? Don’t you have a team for this shit?” Louis knew he was only asking because he was curious. It was true, Louis _had_ been going straight to their older team recently for everything because there were still things Jeff couldn’t do that they could, _but_...

“I _might_ have gotten into a screaming match with Michelle last week about how we were going to handle the birth announcement and I’ve been banned from calling anyone associated with the team.”

“Why is this the first I’m hearing about this?”

“Might be cause i didn’t mention this to Harry?”

“Uh huh.” Jeff sounded unimpressed. “Like you haven’t mentioned the contract you signed with Syco in August?”

“You know why I did that and that it’ll be over at the end of the month anyway.” He’d signed a deal which, in his own words, made him the band’s personal whore for promo season, taking over any and all promotion spots that they would originally give to Harry. It meant he’d been overworked even more in the past three months, but on the plus side Harry had only been required to attend three things: the music video shoot, the album launch date, and one taped interview of his own choosing (he’d chosen a Skype interview with James Corden).

“Just please stop negotiating, or even talking to anyone, without consulting me first. So what do you need me to coordinate?”

“Harry’s in labor. Should be delivering within twenty-four hours. We’d rather no one knows until after we’re home which’ll hopefully be by the weekend. I did run into some fans though. Told them Harry was here for a checkup, that the Sprog was due next week, we didn’t know what it was gonna be, but I may have mentioned a possible name.”

He heard Jeff hum in acknowledgement. “Anything else?”

“I’m gonna be a dad soon,” Louis said as if it finally was hitting home. He stubbed out his cigarette and leaned against the wall.

“Yeah,” Jeff said. “How about you focus on that and let me handle everything else. If you see any post from Harry or you on twitter just know that’s me.”

“Haz has some pics saved that I can send you so you can place us not here.”

“Sounds great. Send them to me and I’ll get to work. Now go. I don’t wanna hear from you til you’ve got a kid throwing up on you.”

“Thanks.”

“Good luck, Louis. Tell Harry we’re hoping the labor is easy.”

“Will do. Bye Jeff.”

“Bye.”

Louis hung up and took a deep breath. He should get back to the waiting room.

***

They’d turned the television on by the time Louis got back, and his mum and Robin were watching some daytime soap like it was the most fascinating thing ever. Des had set up his laptop on a makeshift desk so he could get some work done while he waited. Louis left him to it and settled onto the couch next to his mum. She wrapped an arm around him, letting him cuddle against her and close his eyes.

“You should get some rest, boo.”

He grumbled a little. He felt exhausted but take a nap wouldn’t be fair to Harry, not when he was unable to sleep because of the contractions. “Harry isn’t gonna get to sleep though.”

He could feel his mother judging him even before she said, “that’s ridiculous. Harry will get some sleep, and you won’t be any use to him if you’re exhausted. How will you feel if you’re asleep when the doctor comes in to announce you have a new baby and no one can wake you?”

Louis’ eyes went wide. “How could you say that? And to your own son!”

His mum just gave him a look. “Then do what I suggested and take a nap now.”

Louis wasn’t convinced that he would be able to sleep, but he did as his mum said and moved to an empty couch so he could lay down and try and sleep. He must have drifted off because the next thing he heard was Gemma announcing, “worry not! For the best aunties have arrived, so we can get this show on the road!” He opened his eyes to Gemma entering the room with her arms raised. Lottie and Fizzy trailed behind her, both sporting wide grins at Gemma’s antics.

Louis rolled his eyes. “I’ll alert the papers.”

“Of course you will,” Gemma said as she came over and laid a big, wet kiss on his cheek.

“What the hell are you doing here?” His mum asked, eyes locked on Fizzy.

Gemma intervened quickly and smoothly. “She doesn’t have class this afternoon - good job Haz on going into labor at the best time - and she didn’t want to miss this so I drove up to get her. And now we’re here after a very long trip, ta-da!” She waved her hands out in front of her as if it would distract his mum from the fact that Fizzy was skipping school.

His mum did not seem amused. “You could have waited until Dan picked you up.”

“But _mum_ ,” Fizzy said, voice only slightly pitched towards whiny, “it’s my first nibling!”

Lottie wrapped an arm around her shoulders. “She’s already here and she brought her backpack with homework! Please let her stay? The trip back would be awful.”

“Did you at least inform the school you were leaving?”

Louis watched as all three girls shared a look and then Gemma winced. “Knew I was forgetting something.”

His mum took a deep breath and pulled out her phone. “I’ll handle this. Gemma, next time, check with me before you kidnap Fizzy from school. Even if it’s for something like this.”

“The likelihood of this happening again is pretty slim,” Fizzy said. “I’ll graduate in two years.”

Lottie nudged her shoulder. “Enough time for two more kids.”

Louis closed his eyes, not wanting to even acknowledge that statement.

If he thought having more people would make the waiting less stressful he was sorely disappointed. It didn’t help. His skin was still crawling with anticipation of what was to come. He craved an update on Harry, but there was no nurse popping in to check on them, and he had no idea how to even go about finding one. The waiting room they were in was so secluded he hadn’t seen anyone wander by the door.

By the time Anne came back he was heavily debating the pros of going back downstairs and bumming another cigarette from someone. Or even buying his own pack.

“How is he?” Louis asked the moment Anne was in the room.

She smiled at him. “Doing well. Contractions are hitting him hard but he’s hit four centimeters so he’s almost halfway there.”

Louis buried his face in his hands as Gemma piped up with, “can we see him?”

“You could but one visitor at a time, unfortunately.” Louis could hear the way Anne hesitated over her next words. “Louis, do you want to head back in there?”

Louis’ head shot up. He’d already been with Harry after all, but he wanted nothing more than to be beside him again. He nodded quickly, eyes darting to Des and Robin and Gemma to see if that was okay. “If no one else minds.”

Robin reached over and rubbed his shoulder. “Sitting bedside comes with being the father I’d suspect.”

Louis managed to stand up on shaking legs as he took that for permission. The walk back to Harry’s room wasn’t familiar and Louis knew he’d still get lost if he had had to do it by himself. Harry was still in the bed, eyes shut in pain and it tugged at Louis’ heart. He sat down next to Harry and grasped his hand, letting Harry squeeze through the pain.

Louis felt calmer just sitting there, able to see Harry with his own two eyes. When the contraction seemed to pass he lifted Harry’s hand to his lips, kissing the knuckles. “Hey, love.”

Harry’s eyes fluttered open and he groaned. “Fuck this hurts.”

It killed Louis to see him in this kind of pain. “Thought you were gonna take an epidural.”

Harry just shook his head. “Not a good candidate. Too risky they decided.”

Louis pursed his lips. They’d known this was a possibility. Narrow hips combined with the minute lack of feeling that came from the epidural during the final push of labor meant most male carriers couldn’t safely take it. “Have they given you anything else?”

Harry nodded. “A little, but they aren’t as good, and I can’t take too much so it just,” he winced as he tried to move closer to Louis. “It really sucks.” 

Louis leaned over and kissed the corner of his mouth. “It’ll be over soon. Almost halfway there.”

That didn’t make Harry smile the way he thought it would, but that was okay. At least Harry didn’t look like he was in agonizing pain at this exact moment. “Tell me about the food you ate. I’m starving.”

Louis was immediately concerned. “I can ask a nurse to get you food.”

Harry shook his head. “No don’t want to…” the rest of what he said was a trailed off mess of words Louis couldn’t understand.

“What’s that?”

“It hurts to keep getting up and down and trying to use the bathroom will be difficult so they got me a bed pan.”

It took Louis a moment to work out what Harry was saying. When he did his only reaction was to blink slowly. “And you don’t want to use one? Love, you’re gonna be shitting all over the Sprog as soon as it’s-”

Harry slapped a hand over his mouth. “No! I’m not thinking about that. That is a problem for Future Me to deal with. Present Me still has dignity!”

Louis stifled his laugh because Harry looked genuinely put out. “Alright. I got a croissant with butter, and a scone with jam but I didn’t end up putting either on the pastries because I got a bit distracted.”

Harry moaned in delight. “I don’t even care that you ate them wrong they sound delicious.” 

Louis could only look at him fondly before giving him a kiss. “Next time I’ll try to be less stressed about you giving birth and make sure to butter my scone.”

That managed to make Harry laugh. “Next time you’ll be too busy playing with this one cause they’ll miss their mummy.”

“You know Haz, I don’t think most people talk about having a second kid while they're going through labor with the first one.”

“Since when were we ever like normal people?”

Louis couldn’t argue with that. He stayed with Harry for a bit more, but he knew he should probably let at least Des, if not Robin as well, come in and see him. They’d been waiting since this morning. Harry didn’t complain when he told him he’d be leaving so someone else could come in, but that might have been because he was in the middle of a contraction - again.

Louis frowned at the nurse who was walking him back to the waiting room. “Is this… normal?” He regretted the words before they left his mouth. Of course this was normal. He knew how labor worked.

The nurse just gave him an indulgent smile. “Everything is going as smooth as it can. I promise, there have been no surprises so far, and we don't anticipate any.” He sighed, wanting to believe her but he was still so worried. She seemed to understand because she gave him a pat on the shoulder. "You'll see. And if you guys have a second you'll be much better prepared for everything."

When he got back to the waiting room he tagged Des in to go visit Harry before he collapsed next to Gemma who was watching a movie on her iPad with Lottie.

Waiting sucked.

They made it through two movies, and a couple more rotations of people going in to see Harry, before someone brought in dinner for them. Not long after, Dan showed up with the twins and the babies, looking only mildly flustered. It didn’t do anything to distract him though. Even when his mum handed him Ernest to play with he couldn’t stop his mind from worrying. Sure he pulled faces and made Ernest laugh, but he couldn’t stop thinking about Harry and how much pain he was going through, and Louis just wanted it to be over. He wanted the doctor to come in and tell him that Harry had delivered the Sprog healthy and safe. Was that too much to ask?

The door to the waiting room opened.

Louis shot up from his seat at Robin and a nurse’s reappearance. He couldn’t have been gone more than thirty minutes, having waited until Des and Gemma had gotten to go in before taking his turn. There was no way he’d just left unless-

Robin met his eyes as the room fell silent, waiting for an update. “There’s no baby yet, but Harry’s fully dilated so I’ve been kicked out so the doctors could come in. They think it won’t be long now.”

Nerves and excitement immediately washed over Louis and it was so strange to feel both at the same time. He squeezed Ernest a little closer to his chest because this was it. This was the home stretch. They’d been here all day but it was finally happening. Before the night was out he was going to be a father.

It was too much to take in while sitting and he let Daisy take Ernest from him so he could stand up and walk around. No one approached him as he paced the length of the room nervously, chewing on his thumb. He didn’t even want to look at the time, to know how long hadn’t passed since Des came back into the room;

He _really_ hated waiting.

He didn’t track how many turns he’d made but eventually Des came up to him and wrapped an arm around his shoulder. “Here, let’s sit down before you wear a hole in the ground.” He guided Louis back to a couch to sit him down at. “Nervous?” Des asked and Louis nodded before he could properly think.

“Fucking terrified. Like I know he’s gonna be fine, and the Sprog is gonna be healthy but it’s taking so long.”

To Des’ credit he didn’t point out all the ways Louis was being ridiculous. He just wrapped an arm around his shoulder and pulled him in for a hug. “Harry’s a tough one. He’ll be alright.”

“Dunno how you’ve done this twice,” Louis admitted.

Des laughed. “Lots of grey hairs.”

Louis managed to get out a little laugh. “I don’t think I’ll be able to pull off the grey.”

They fell silent, but the chatter from everyone else in the room continued. It felt like an eternity before the door opened and Dr. Smith walked in. Louis looked up, surprised because he hadn't been sure Dr. Smith would even be on staff today, as everyone immediately went quiet with anticipation. Louis’ heart started pounding even as Dr. Smith smiled at everyone before turning to him.

“Evening. I’ll cut right to the good news. At 20:16 Harry successfully delivered a healthy baby boy.”

Louis’ heart exploded. He felt like he’d been hit with a hundred thousand emotions at once. Relief. Excitement. Love.

He wanted to see his son.

He slowly came out of his stupor to the feeling of arms wrapped around him. Anne and his mum were on either side of him, both in tears. He managed to hug both of them in return. He didn’t remember getting up, and only vaguely registered the assembly line of congratulations he received before he was walking beside Dr. Smith on the way to Harry’s room. He was still talking but Louis’ head was rushing too much to register what was being said. He just nodded and smiled where it seemed appropriate and hoped for the best.

The only thing he did remember of that walk was pulling out his phone and plugging an event into his calendar.

**November 18. Sprog’s Birthday.**

He set it to repeat each year.

Dr. Smith let him go in first and Louis’ eyes immediately went to Harry.

Nothing else mattered.

There Harry was, sitting up in the bed with a pink and blue bundle in his arms. Louis barely even noticed as a nurse came over and put a wristband on him. He could only look at Harry and the Sprog. A sharp wail cut through his thoughts and Louis stuttered forward with a gentle push from Dr. Smith until he was standing beside Harry.

Harry was cooing at their son, trying to soothe him as he started to cry. Louis watched for a moment, still in awe because he could see pink skin peeking out from the blanket and he wanted desperately to hold him.

“Hi,” he breathed.

Harry finally seemed to realize he was there, tearing his eyes away from the Sprog - oh god they needed a _name_ \- to look at him. Harry’s face was glowing. Sure he looked exhausted from the past fifteen hours but none of that seemed to show in his demeanor. He looked back at the Sprog as he tilted the blanket, revealing their son’s face.

“Look who’s here, little Sproggy,” Harry whispered as he cradled the Sprog. “It’s daddy. Can’t have the first image daddy has of you be you crying.” He looked up at Louis with a fond smile. “He’s having trouble latching. He got it for a couple minutes but couldn’t hold on for too long.”

Louis swallowed. Their son was beautiful. He had a scrunched up face and a little button nose - and okay - he actually looked a lot like other babies but he was _theirs_ and Louis - Louis could just tell. The Sprog was special. “Can I hold him?”

He sat down at the edge of the bed, reaching for the bundle even before Harry nodded.

The Sprog was still fussing as Harry handed him over and Louis gave him a soothing rock as he pushed the blanket down so he could get a good look at his son’s face. He had wisps of fine, light brown hair and as he paused in fussing Louis could see his eyes were baby blue. He wondered if they would stay that color or if they would change to be closer to Harry's green. Either option was fine with him.

“Hello, love,” he whispered, creeping his right hand slowly up so he could caress the Sprog’s cheek. “Don’t cry. Gonna break me heart.” His breath caught as the Sprog’s eyes locked with his and suddenly the Sprog wasn’t crying anymore. “Haz, Haz! He’s looking at me,” he whispered, not daring to take his eyes off their little boy.

He felt Harry lean into him, wrapping one arm around Louis’ back as his other joined Louis in holding the Sprog. Louis could feel his eyes starting to tear up but he didn’t care. Their son had stopped crying when he looked at him. No moment would ever beat this one.

“He’s beautiful,” Louis whispered.

“Yeah,” Harry agreed. “And a big boy.”

“How big was he?” He was positive Dr. Smith mentioned but he hadn’t been listening.

“Nine and a half pounds. Twenty-one inches.”

“Jesus,” Louis said, eyes widening even as he watched the Sprog’s attention waver as he started to look around. “Gonna be a giant like you.”

“I’m not that big,” Harry mumbled, shifting closer.

The Sprog’s eyes wandered over to Harry and he started making noise. Louis followed his line of sight and saw he was looking at the gap in Harry’s gown. “Think he’s still hungry.”

They had a couple close fumbles as they tried to rearrange themselves so Harry was holding the Sprog safely and Louis was wrapped around both of them as protectively as possible, but they eventually managed. Louis watched completely fascinated as Harry coaxed the Sprog into latching onto his nipple, little hand sticking out so he could rest his fist against the small bump of Harry’s chest.

“He’s perfect,” Louis whispered, and Harry nodded.

“I don’t think I’m ever gonna be able to put him down. There goes swaddling and teaching him to soothe himself.”

Louis couldn’t blame Harry. Self-soothing was overrated, he was positive. He carefully slid one finger over to their son’s curled up fist. When their son relaxed his fist just a little Louis placed his finger against the exposed palm and smiled as four little fingers and a thumb curled around his finger. Their son could barely wrap his whole hand around his finger and for some reason that was what finally tipped Louis over into tears. He buried his face into Harry’s shoulder, careful not to remove his finger because he didn’t want to lose that connection. Harry let him cry and Louis managed to get it down to just sniffles soon enough. He turned his head, eyes still watery as he watched the Sprog breastfeed.

“Me boys,” he said, voice choked up. “Me wonderful boys. I love both of you so much.”

“We love you too,” Harry said, turning his head so he could kiss Louis.

It was a short and sweet kiss that ended too soon when Harry let out a surprised noise. They both looked down to see the Sprog had dropped the nipple. He wasn’t fussing though so Harry didn’t try to have him continue feeding, just adjusted him in his arms, pulling the Sprog closer so they could all three be touching skin to skin.

Louis didn’t know how long they stayed there curled up together but at some point a nurse coughed politely, interrupting them.

“I’ll need to take this little guy in for a bath and get him to the nursery. You’ll be able to see him again a couple hours after his exams.” The nurse sounded a bit regretful and that’s the only reason Louis didn’t kick up a fuss. He didn’t want to let the Sprog go but he did understand why they needed to take him.

“Yeah,” he said.

“Sure,” Harry said.”

Neither of them moved to hand the Sprog over.

At least the nurse seemed to take it with good humor. “Did you want a picture? We can do a polaroid.” She said as she headed over to the counter in the room and pulled out a camera. “We offer this for all newborns.”

It was a weak bribe but Louis locked eyes with Harry and they both nodded.

They didn’t move from how they were curled up, just waited for the nurse to position herself and take the picture. She didn’t have to tell them to smile, they were both beaming. She snapped the shot.

The whirring noise didn’t even bother the Sprog and Louis glanced down at him with a wide smile. “Love you my little boy,” he whispered, finally getting up the courage to lean down and kiss his forehead. He’d been worried before about startling the Sprog but he seemed like a chill baby. “Love you so much.”

“Umm, what have you named him?” The nurse asked.

Louis pulled up, looking at Harry.

Oh yeah. A name.

“Uh… we’ll get back to you on that,” Harry said.

The nurse laughed and finished filling out the bottom of the polaroid. “Switch?” She asked, holding out the polaroid.

Louis slowly untangled himself from being wrapped around Harry so he could take the polaroid. Harry gave the Sprog his own kiss, whispering how much he loved him before he finally handed the Sprog to the nurse.

“Try and get some rest, alright?” The nurse said before she left the room.

Harry collapsed back on the bed the moment she was gone. “Miss him already.”

Louis resumed the cuddling position they’d been in which was comfortable even sans Sprog. “Me too. Good pic of us though.” He held it up for Harry to see.

The lighting was shit, too dark over all, and the flash washed both of them out but all Louis saw was how happy they looked, cuddled up and holding their son. On the bottom the nurse had written in bubbly print **Baby Styles-Tomlinson 18/11/15**

“Got the last name wrong,” Harry said.

“Semantics,” Louis said. “Gonna need a name for the Sprog. Now that he’s here.”

Harry hummed. “Stephen?”

“Nah. Needs to be perfect. Just like him.”

“He is perfect isn’t he? And he’s all ours.”

Louis’ heart skipped a beat at that. “Yeah.”

“What about Percy?”

Louis snorted. “You’ve got to be kidding.”

Harry was smiling. “Charlie?”

“No.”

“Bill?”

“Are you- are you just naming the Weasley brothers?”

Harry giggled. “I did like the name Fred.”

“But _I_ didn’t,” Louis reminded him, giving him a quick kiss. “Lawrence?”

“No. Bad choice.”

“I don’t know. Lewis, Harold, and Lawrence. Great sitcom.”

“You’re an idiot.”

“An idiot who you just let father your child.”

That sent Harry into another giggle fest that lasted until he groaned. “Ugh, think those fifteen hours of labor are catching up to me.”

Louis immediately went into protective mode, helping Harry settle in comfortably. “Need me to get a nurse?”

“No, should be fine. Just you know, pushed a baby out of me. And I’m feeling it.”

Louis couldn’t help but smile. “How about you get some rest. We can come up with a name later. I’ll be here when you wake up.”

“Promise?” Harry asked, eyes drooping.

“Pinky promise,” Louis said as he kissed Harry one more time. “Love you.”

“I love you too.”

“And thank you, for everything.”

Harry drifted off with a smile on his face, and Louis could only think about how lucky he was.


	10. december

Calum crying was what woke Louis up. He didn’t even bother to look at the time, just pulled himself out of bed to get over to the bassinet as quick as possible so Harry didn’t wake up. Louis picked Calum up on pure muscle memory, his eyes not even fully open.

“Hey, hey, what’s the matter?” He whispered to his son as he walked out of the room. He checked Calum’s diaper but it was dry, and Calum was still fussing. “You hungry? Did mummy feed you before bed?”

He made it downstairs already pretty positive that was why Calum was awake. He grabbed his iPad with his free hand, checking the message Harry had sent him before he’d gone to bed three hours ago. It confirmed what he’d thought; Calum hadn’t wanted food so he’d gone to sleep without eating.

Louis looked down at Calum with a tired smile. “You slept three hours? What a good boy.”

Calum had had issues sleeping through the night. The first week they were home they’d been lucky to get him down for a full ninety minutes. Louis had very little memory of that first week, which was a little embarrassing because he used to boast about running on such little sleep. Only in the past couple days had he finally started settling into a pattern Louis was more used to with newborns. It was only one A.M. and while Louis had gotten four hours of sleep he was hopeful that after eating Calum would go back to sleep for another couple hours.

He went about heating up a bottle almost mechanically, positive he could do this in his sleep. Calum was still fussing in his arm and Louis pulled a funny face in hopes it would distract him. It didn’t work and Louis sighed. He hated hearing his little boy cry. It was the most heartbreaking thing ever. Louis just wanted him to be happy always.

The microwave beeped and Louis took out the bottle. He tested the temperature of the milk - doing it one handed was a skill he’d learned - and then held it up for Calum. Calum immediately latched onto the bottle, suckingly happily. Louis couldn’t help but smile.

“See? That’s all you need. A good bottle.”

“I coulda fed him.”

Louis glanced up to see Harry coming into the kitchen in just his pants. His post-pregnancy body was on full display. He was soft, with a little tummy now, and his chest still swelled from breastfeeding. Neither of them minded and Harry wasn’t in hurry to “reclaimed his pre-baby figure” as the media kept saying. It was part of the package that was the miracle of life, as Harry liked to say every time he heard a comment about that. “Love, go back to sleep.”

“I will once you do,” Harry said around a yawn. “Hard to sleep without you.”

Calum had perked up at the sound of his mum, but he dutifully kept feeding since there was food left. Nothing got between their boy and feeding time.

“You sent me that message at eleven. You couldn’t have had more than a couple hours of sleep.”

“I’m fine, Lou. Had as much as the Sprog.”

Louis smiled. “Not getting any younger. Gonna be a big ole 22 in a month.”

“And you turn 24 today. If being 22 is old you’re almost ancient.”

Louis suppressed a laugh right as Calum finished the bottle. Louis handed Calum over to Harry who already had a spit up rag on his bare shoulder so he could burp him. They’d gotten incredibly coordinated at this, even half-asleep.

“What time is everyone coming by again?” He asked as he washed out the bottle.

“About one. Gives us time to get up and have Calum all dressed. You’re gonna look so cute in your little outfit, aren’t you?” Harry said to Calum as he gently patted his back.

Louis smiled. They’d gotten him an elf onesie that did look adorable on him, especially paired with the matching baby beanie that only stayed on his head about six percent of the time. “Grandmas are gonna eat him up. Get your cuddles in now, Haz. We aren’t seeing him again.”

Family had been in and out of their home for most of the last month, and Anne had even stayed with them for that week Louis couldn’t remember, but she’d left so they could establish their own routine the three of them (and also she had work). Today and tomorrow would be the first big gathering that Calum would experience and they were excited to see how Calum handled all of the attention. Even though they were technically celebrating his birthday today and Christmas tomorrow Louis personally saw it as celebrating Christmas twice because he was pretty sure they were all opening presents both days. Calum had a lot of them. Harry and him had gone a little overboard, and he knew that his mum and Anne were both taking their roles as grandmothers very seriously. Calum was going to want for nothing growing up.

“There we go,” Harry muttered as Calum finally burped. Louis watched as Harry wiped his mouth before putting the rag to the side and cuddling Calum to his shoulder. “Look Lou, he’s drifting back off.”

Louis let out a quiet cheer as he went over to hug the two of them. “Course he is. He just got to eat and now he’s being held by his mum.”

Harry leaned down and kissed Calum’s cheek. “Our good little Sprog. Sleeping soundly for a couple hours so me and your dad can do that same. We’re both very thankful.”

Louis laughed and pressed his own kiss to the back of Calum’s head. “Come on love, let’s get back to bed.”

They crept back upstairs, both thankful the dogs had slept through Calum’s feeding. If they had woken up they would no doubt excite him. It had happened a few times already as the dogs got used to having a baby in the house. They were getting better about handling Calum though, as well as Harry and him wandering around at all hours of the night.

Harry swaddled Calum back up before laying him in his bassinet once they were back in their room. Louis watched as he kissed his forehead. “Love you, little one. Even if you’re gonna wake up in twenty minutes demanding a diaper change.”

“He’s gotten to about thirty minutes.”

Harry stretched as he stood up. “Want me to stay up?”

Louis shook his head. “Nah, I will.”

Harry gave him a look. “We could stay up together.”

Louis thought about that but then shook his head. “Remember the last time we did that? Thinking he’d wake up and it took him almost two hours to need a diaper change?”

“Oh yeah, that’s true. Guess we should just catch some sleep.”

“Get into bed,” Louis said as he traded places with Harry so he could kiss Calum as well. “Night, little Sproggy. Love you so much.” He yawned as he stood back up and headed to the bed. Harry had already climbed back under his covers. “We should talk about moving him into his room soon.”

Harry groaned. This was a conversation that neither of them really wanted to deal with. They knew they’d have to move him into his room eventually, and they had baby monitors ready, but they really liked being in the same room as him. It meant he didn’t cry as long since they were right there. “Do we need to do this right now?”

“We have it every time I remember, which is usually when we’re putting him to bed.”

Harry yawned. “I don’t mind him in here. I wouldn’t even mind him being in bed with us-”

“No. I will be too worried about rolling over and crushing him-”

“You wouldn’t roll over at all. You don’t move in your sleep as it is. It would be double so if he was in bed with us. Your body just knows. It’s what dad told me at least.”

“I wouldn’t be able to sleep.”

“One day I’m gonna put him in bed with you while you’re napping and you’ll see I’m right.” Harry yawned again, shifting over so he was curled up to Louis’ side.

“If you do that I’m divorcing you.”

“Can’t divorce me if we aren’t married yet.”

Louis snorted. “That’s what you think.”

“You won’t be able to divorce me once we’re married. Just won’t be able to do it. I’m too adorable.” Harry kissed whatever skin he could find and it made Louis’ heart skip.

“Guess I’ll just have to marry you and we’ll find out.”

“Sounds like a plan. How’s January first sound to you?” Harry didn't sound flippant when he said that. He sounded like he was making a perfectly reasonable suggestion.

Louis eyes popped. “Wait, are you setting an actual date? Haz, it’s like two in the morning you can’t spring this on me.”

He looked down to see that Harry was smiling with his eyes closed. “Is that a problem?”

It wasn’t a problem exactly, it was just that with Calum being born they’d decided to postpone the wedding ceremony they’d been planning for next spring to an unknown date. And since postponing it they hadn’t talked about rescheduling. It wasn’t that important in comparison to making sure everything had been ready for Calum, and then taking care of him.

“Not a problem. Just wondering what brought this up. Thought we were having a big celebration next year.”

“I’ve just been thinking about it. We can still have a big ceremony, but we should do the paperwork earlier. _I’d_ like to do the paperwork earlier.”

So this was the position Louis found himself in when he agreed to marry Harry. Two A.M. on his birthday, their son freshly asleep, Harry curled up against his chest, and him exhausted beyond all hell. “Alright. Let’s get married on the first.”

Harry squeezed him. “You mean it?”

Louis leaned down to give him a kiss. “Of course. I’ve wanted to marry you since I met you. Almost as much as I’ve wanted to knock you up.”

Harry laughed against his mouth. “Did it a bit out of order.”

“Fuck order. We did it right.” He kissed Harry again and they settled back into bed. “I love you.”

“Love you too,” Harry mumbled right before his breath evened out and he fell asleep.

Louis was right behind him, drifting off into peaceful sleep right until Calum’s cries cut through his sleep for the second time that night..

_Diaper change time._

Louis untangled himself from Harry so he could get up and change his son’s diaper. Even exhausted he wouldn’t change a single thing in his life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> THE END! :D (comments and kudos would be lovely)


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